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.»..?...'.. A. A..1..J. 



THE BIBLE 









AND OTHER SACRED BOOKS 

BY 

MILTON S. TERRY, D.D. 

Professor in Garrett Biblical Institute 



Copyright, 1890, by Hunt & Eaton, New York. 



THE BIBLE AND OTHER SACRED BOOKS 



A CONTRIBUTION 



TO THE STUDY OF 



APOLOGETICS AND COMPARATIVE THEOLOGY 




)CT 



z-fo 9 3 X 



MILTON S. TERRY, D.D 






Professor in Garrett Biblical Institute 



NEW YORK: HUNT & EATON 

CINCINNATI: CRANSTON S* STOWE 

1890 



THE BIBLE AND OTHER SACRED BOOKS. 



It has become an important preparation for the profitable study of 
the Bible to be able to appreciate its rank and value as compared 
with other sacred books. During the last half century other reliRi0US 
the learned research and diligent labour of scholars have literatures a vai- 
made accessible to us whole literatures of nations that t ion for herme*- 
were comparatively unknown before. It is discovered neutlca i stud F- 
that the ancient Egyptians, the Persians, the Hindus, the Chinese, 
and other nations, have had their sacred writings, some of which 
claim an antiquity greater than the books of Moses. There are not 
wanting, in Christian lands, men disposed to argue that these sacred 
books of the nations possess a value as great as the scriptures of the 
Christian faith, and are entitled to the same veneration. Such 
claims are not to be ignored or treated with contempt. There have 
been, doubtless, savage islanders who imagined that the sun rose 
and set for their sole benefit, and who never dreamed that the sound- 
ing waters about their island home were at the same time washing 
beautiful corals and precious pearls on other shores. Among civil- 
ized peoples, also, there are those who have no appreciation of lands, 
nations, literatures, and religions which differ from their own. This, 
however, is a narrowness unworthy of the Christian scholar. The 
truly catholic Christian will not refuse to acknowledge the manifest 
excellences of races or religions that differ from his own. He will 
be governed in his judgments by the precept of the apostle (Phil, 
iv, 8) : " Whatever things are true, whatever things are worthy of 
honour (aefivd), whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, 
whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if 
there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think upon (Xoyi&ode, 
exercise reason upon) these things." The study and comparison of 
other scriptures will serve, among other things, to show how pre- 
eminently the Christian's Bible is adapted to the spiritual nature 
and religious culture of all mankind. 1 

1 " This volume," says Professor Phelps, " has never yet numbered among its re- 
ligious believers a fourth part of the human race, yet it has swayed a greater amount 
of mind than any other volume the world has known. It has the singular faculty of 
attracting to itself the thinkers of the world, either as friends or as foes, always and 
everywhere." Men and Books, p. 239. New York, 1882. 



Literature of the Christian Canon. 

The scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the gradual 
accretion of a literature that covers about sixteen centuries. The 
outline of Bib- different parts were contributed at different times, and 
licai Literature by many different hands. According to the order of 
the C ° n cnristian books in the Christian Canon, we have, first, the five 
canon. Books of Moses, which embody the Ten Commandments, 

with their various accessory statutes, moral, civil, and ceremonial, 
all set in a historical background of singular simplicity and gran- 
deur. Then follow twelve Historical Books, recording the history 
of the Israelitish nation from the death of Moses to the restoration 
from Babylonian exile, and covering a period of a thousand years. 
Next follow five Poetical Books — a drama, a psalter, two books of 
proverbial philosophy, and a song of love ; and after these are sev- 
enteen Prophetical Books, among which are some of the most mag- 
nificent monuments of all literature. In the New Testament we 
have, first, the four Gospels, which record the life and words of 
Jesus Christ; then the Acts of the Apostles, a history of the origin 
of the Christian Church; then the thirteen Epistles of Paul, fol- 
lowed by the Epistlo to the Hebrews, and the seven General Epis- 
tles; and, finally, the Apocalypse of John. Here, at a rapid glance, 
we see an ancient library of history, law, theology, philosophy, 
poetry, prophecy, epistles, and biography. Most of these books 
still bear their author's names, some of whom we find to have been 
kings, some prophets, some shepherds, some fishermen. One was a 
taxgatherer, another a tentmaker, another a physician, but all were 
deeply versed in sacred things. There could have been no collusion 
among them, for they lived and wrote in different ages, centuries 
apart, and their places of residence were far separate, as Arabia, 
Palestine, Babylon, Persia, Asia Minor, Greece, and Rome. 1 The 
antiquities and varying civilizations of these different nations and 
countries are imaged in these sacred books, and, where the name of 
an author is not known, it is not difficult to ascertain approximately, 
from his statements or allusions, the time and circumstances of his 
writing. The nation with whom these books originated, and the 
lands that nation occupied first and last, are so well known, and so 
accurately identified, as to give a living freshness and reality to 

1 Geike says : " Scripture proves throughout to be only so many notes in a divine har- 
mony which culminates in the angel song over Bethlehem. What less than Divine in- 
spiration could have evolved such unity of purpose and spirit in the long series of sacred 
writers, no one of whom could possibly be conscious of the part he was being made to 
take in the development of God's ways to our race '? " Hours with the Bible, vol. i, p. 5. 



these records; and the rich and varied contents of the several books 
are such as to make them of priceless value to all men and all ages. 
"I am of opinion," wrote Sir William Jones — a most competent 
judge on such a subject — "that this volume, independently of its 
divine origin, contains mere true sublimity, more exquisite beauty, 
more pure morality, more important history, and finer strains of 
poetry and eloquence, than can be collected from all other books, 
in whatever age or language they may have been written." 1 Let 
us now compare and contrast these scriptures with the sacred books 
of other nations. 

The Avesta. 

No body of sacred literature except the Christian Canon can be 
of much greater interest to the student of history than the scrip- 
tures of the Parsees, which are commonly called the . -' , .„ 

' # ; J Antiquity and 

Zend-Avesta. They contain the traditions and cere- general char- 
monies of the old Iranian faith, the religion of Zoro- acter * 
aster, or (more properly) Zarathustra. They have sadly suffered 
by time and the revolutions of empire, and come to us greatly 
mutilated and corrupted, but since they were first brought to the 
knowledge of the western world by the enthusiastic Frenchman, 
Anquetil-Duperron, 2 whose adventures in the East read like a ro- 
mance from the Arabian Nights, the studies of European scholars 
have put us in possession of their general scope and subject matter. 3 
They consist of four distinct sections, the Yasna, the Vispered, the 
Yendidad, and a sort of separate hagiographa, commonly called 
Khordah- Avesta. 

The main principles of the Avesta religion are thus summed up 
by Darmesteter : " The world, such as it is now, is two- Doctrinal sys . 
fold, being the work of two hostile beings, Ahura- tern of the 
Mazda, the good principle, and Angra-Mainyu, the evil Avea a * 
principle ; all that is good in the world comes from the former, all 

1 "Written on a blank leaf of his Bible. 

2 In his work entitled, Zend-Avesta, ouvrage de Zoroastre, contenant les Idees Theo- 
logiques, Physiques et Morales de ce Legislateur, 3 vols., Par., 1771. 

3 Especially deserving of mention are Eugene Burnouf, Commentaire sur le Yacna, 
3 vol3.. Par., 1833; Westergaard, Zendavesta, Copenh., 1852-54; Spiegel, who has 
published the original text, with a full critical apparatus, and also a German transla- 
tion, with a commentary on both the text and translation, Lpz., 1853-1868; Haug, 
Essays on the Sacred Language, Writings, and Religion of the Parsees, Bombay, 1862 ; 
also Die Gathas des Zarathustra, Lpz., 1858; Windischmann, Zoroastrische Studien, 
Berl., 1863. An English version of the Avesta from Spiegel's German version, by 
A. H. Bleek, was published in London, in 1864, and a better one from the original 
text by J. Darmesteter and L. H. Mills, in vols, iv, xxiii and xxxi of the Sacred 
Books of the East, edited by Max Miiller. 



that is bad in it comes from the latter. The history of the world 
is the history of their conflict, how Angra-Mainyu invaded the 
world of Ahura-Mazda and marred it, and how he shall be expelled 
from it at last. Man is active in the conflict, his duty in it being 
laid before him in the law revealed by Ahura-Mazda to Zarathustra. 
When the appointed time is come, a son of the lawgiver, still un- 
born, named Saoshyant, will appear, Angra-Mainyu and Hell will be 
destroyed, men will rise from the dead, and everlasting happiness 
will reign over the world." 1 
The oldest portion of the A vesta is called the Yasna, which, 
along with the Yispered, constitutes the Parsee Lit- 
urgy, and consists of praises of Ahura-Mazda, and all 
the lords of purity, and of invocations for them to be present at 
the ceremonial worship. Many of these prayers contain little more 
than the names and attributes of the several objects or patrons of 
the Zoroastrian worship, and the perusal of them soon becomes 
tedious. The following constitutes the whole of the twelfth 
chapter, and is one of the finest passages, and a favourite : 

I praise the well-thought, well-spoken, well-performed thoughts, words, 
and works. I lay hold on all good thoughts, words, and works. I aban- 
don all evil thoughts, words, and works. I bring to you, O Amesha- 
Spentas, 8 praise and adoration, with thoughts, words, and works, with 
heavenly mind, the vital strength of my own body. 

The following, from the beginning of the thirteenth chapter, is 
another favourite : 

I drive away the dawas (demons), I profess myself a Zarathustrian, an 
expeller of dasvas, a follower of Ahura, a hymn-singer of the Amesha- 
Spentas, a praiser of the Amesha-Spentas. To Ahura-Mazda, the Good, 
endued with good wisdom, I offer all good. To the Pure, Rich, Majestic; 
whatever are the best goods to him, to whom the cow, to whom purity 
belongs ; from whom arises the light, the brightness which is inseparable 
from the lights. Spenta-Armaiti, the good, choose I; may she belong to 
me! By my praise will I save the cattle from theft and robbery. 

The latter part of the Yasna contains the religious hymns known 

rm. r, «. as tne Glathas. They are believed to be the oldest por- 
The Gathas. - , A J . r 

tion ot the Avesta, and are written in a more ancient 

dialect. But a considerable part of them is scarcely intelligible, all 

the learning and labour of scholars having thus far failed to clear up 

1 Darmesteter, Translation of the Avesta, Introduction, p. lvi. 

3 The Amesha-Spentas, six in number, were at first mere personifications of virtues 
and moral or liturgical powers ; but as Ahura-Mazda, their lord and father, ruled over 
the whole of the world, they took by and by each a part of the world under their 
care. Comp. Darmesteter, p. lxxi. 



the difficulties of the ancient text. The general drift of thought, 
however, is apparent. Praises are continually addressed to the holy 
powers, especially to the Holy Spirit Ahura-Mazda (Orniuzd), the 
Creator, the Rejoicer, the Pure, the Fair, the Heavenly, the Ruler 
over all, the Most Profitable, the Friend for both worlds. Many a 
noble sentiment is uttered in these ancient hymns, but, at the same 
time, a much larger amount of frivolous matter. 

The Vispered is but a liturgical addition to the Yasna, and of sim- 
ilar character. It contains twenty-seven chapters, of The vispered. 
which the following, from the eighth chapter, is a specimen: 

The right-spoken words praise we. 

The holy Sraosha praise we. 

The good purity praise we. 

Nairo-Sanha praise we. 

The victorious peaces praise we. 

The undaunted, who do not come to shame, praise we. 

The Fravashis (souls) of the pure praise we. 

The bridge Chinvat 1 praise we. 

The dwelling of Ahura-Mazda praise we. 

The best place of the pure praise we, 

The shining, wholly brilliant. 
The best-arriving at Paradise praise we. 

The Vendidad, consisting of twenty-two chapters, or fargards, 
is of a different character. It is a minute code of Zoro- 
astrian laws, most of which, however, refer to matters 
of purification. The first fargard enumerates the countries which 
were created by Ahura-Mazda, and afterward corrupted by the evil 
principle, Angra-Mainyu, who is full of death and opposition to 
the good. The second introduces us to Yima, the fair, who refused 
to be the teacher, recorder, or bearer of the law, but became the 
protector and overseer of the world. Chapter third enumerates 
things which are most acceptable and most displeasing to the world ; 
and chapter fourth describes breaches of contracts and other sins, 
and prescribes the different degrees of punishment for each, declar- 
ing, among other things, that a man's nearest relatives may become 
involved in his punishment, even to a thousandfold. Chapters fifth 
to twelfth treat uncleanness occasioned by contact with dead bod- 
ies, and the means of purification. Chapters thirteenth and four- 
teenth praise the dog, and heavy punishments are enjoined for those 
who injure the animal so important and valuable to a pastoral peo- 
ple. Fargards fifteenth and sixteenth give laws for the treatment of 

1 Over which the good are supposed to pass into Paradise. 



8 

women, and condemn seduction and attempts to procure abortion. 
Fargard seventeenth gives directions concerning paring the nails 
and cutting the hair. The remaining five chapters contain numer- 
ous conversations between Ahura-Mazda and Zoroaster, and appear 
to be fragmentary additions to the original Vendidad. 

The rest of the Parsee scriptures are comprehended under what 
The Khordah- i s commonly called the Khordah-Avesta, that is, the 
Avesta. small Avesta. This part contains the Yashts and Nya- 

yis, prayers and praises addressed to the various deities of the 
Zoroastrian faith ; also the Aferin and Afrigan, praises and thanks- 
givings ; the Sirozah, praises to the deities of the thirty days of the 
month; the Gahs, prayers to the different subdivisions of the day; 
and the Patets, or formularies of confession. 

These praises and prayers of the small Avesta are intended for 
the use of the people, as those of the Yasna and Yispered are prin- 
cipally for the priests. Taken altogether, these Parsee scriptures 
are a prayer-book, or ritual, rather than a bible. But though they 
are associated with the venerable name of Zoroaster, and tradition 
has it that he composed two million verses, yet nothing in this vol- 
ume can with certainty be ascribed to him, and he himself is a dim 
and mythical personage. In all these writings there is a vagueness 
and uncertainty about subject matter, date, and authorship. Dar- 
mesteter says : " As the Parsees are the ruins of a people, so are 
their sacred books the ruins of a religion. There has been no other 
great belief in the world that ever left such poor and meagre monu- 
ments of its past splendor." ' 

Assyrian Sacred Records. 

The cuneiform inscriptions on the monuments of the Assyrian, 
vast range of Babylonian, and Persian empires have been found to ( 
cuneiform in- em °o d y a vast literature, embracing history, law, sci-' 
scriptions. ence, poetry, and religion. To the interpretation of 
these monumental records a number of eminent orientalists, 2 chiefly 
English and French, have been, within the last half century, devot- 
ing unwearied study, and many of the most interesting inscriptions 
have been deciphered and translated into the languages of modern 
Europe. At the date of the earliest monumental records, two dif- 
ferent races appear to have settled upon the plains of the Euphrates 
and Tigris, one using a Semitic, the other a Scythian or Turanian 

1 Translation of the Zend-Avesta ; Introduction, p. xii. 

2 Among the most distinguished Assyriologists are Rawlinson, Hincks, Norris, George 
Smith, Talbot, Sayce, Botta, De Saulcy, Oppert, Lenormant, Menant, and Schrader. 



9 

language. They are designated by the names Sumir and Akkad, 
but what particular sections of the country each inhabited, or which 
particular language each spoke, does not appear. 1 They were, 
probably, much intermixed, as many of their cities bear both Sem- 
itic and Scythian names. " The Accadians," says Sayce, " were the 
inventors of the cuneiform system of writing, and the earliest pop- 
ulation of Babylonia of whom we know. They spoke an aggluti- 
native language, allied to Finnic or Tartar, and had originally come 
from the mountainous country to the southwest of the Caspian. 
The name Accada signifies ' highlander,' and the name of Accad is 
met with in the tenth chapter of Genesis." 2 The successive Assyr- 
ian, Babylonian, and Persian conquerors adopted the Accadian sys- 
tem of writing, and it became variously modified by each. 

The inscriptions thus far deciphered are mostly, fragmentary, and 

the study of them has not yet been carried far enough T . „ „ 

. *: J ° Inscriptions de- 

to furnish a full account of all the tribes and languages ciphered most- 

they represent. But enough has already been placed 1 y fra « mentar 5 r - 
within the reach of English readers to show that those ancient peo- 
ples had an extensive sacred literature. Their prayers and hymns 
and laws were graven on monumental tablets, often on the high 
rocks, and they are worthy to be compared with the sacred books 
of other lands and nations. 3 

The royal inscriptions on these monuments are noticeable for their 
religious character. Though full of most pompous self Reliol0us tone 
assertion they abound with devout acknowledgments, of me royal in- 
showing that those ancient monarchs never hesitated to scnptl0ns - 
confess their dependence on the powers above. Witness the fol- 
lowing inscription of Khammurabi, who ruled in Babylonia some 
centuries before the time of Moses : 

Khammurabi the exalted king, the king of Babylon, the king renowned 
throughout the world; conqueror of the enemies of Marduk; the king be- 
loved by his heart am I. 

1 " The Turanian people," says George Smith, " who appear to have been the origi- 
nal inhabitants of the country, invented the cuneiform mode of writing ; all the earli- 
est inscriptions are in that language, but the proper names of most of the kings and 
principal persons are written in Semitic, in direct contrast to the body of the inscrip- 
tions. The Semites appear to have conquered the Turanians, although they had not 
yet imposed their language on the country." Records of the Past, vol. iii, p. 3. 

2 Preface to his translation of a Tablet of Ancient Accadian Laws, Records of the 
Past, vol. iii, p. 21. 

3 A very convenient and valuable collection of these inscriptions, translated into 
English by leading oriental scholars, is published by Bagster & Sons, of London, un- 
der the title of Records of the Past (12 volumes, 1875-1881). Every alternate volume 
of the series contains translations from the Egyptian monuments. 



10 

The favour of god and Bel the people of Sumir and Accad gave unto my 
government. Their celestial weapons unto my hand they gave. 

The canal Khammurabi, the joy of men, a stream of abundant waters, 
for the people of Sumir and Accad, I excavated. Its banks, all of them, I 
restored to newness; new supporting walls I heaped up; perennial waters 
for the people of Sumir and Accad I provided. 

The people of Sumir and Accad, all of them, in general assemblies I as- 
sembled. A review and inspection of them I ordained every year. In joy 
and abundance I watched over them, and in peaceful dwellings I caused 
them to dwell. 

By the divine favour I am Khammurabi the exalted king, the worshipper 
of the Supreme deity. 

With the prosperous power which Marduk gave me I built a lofty cita- 
del, on a high mound of earth, whose summits rose up like mountains, on 
the banks of Khammurabi river, the joy of men. 

To that citadel I gave the name of the mother who bore me and the 
father who begat me. In the holy name of Ri, the mother who bore me, 
and of the father who begat me, during long ages may it last ! 1 

Similar devout acknowledgments are found in nearly all the royal 
annals. Sargon's great inscription on the palace of Khorsabad 
declares : 

The gods Assur, Nebo, and Merodach have conferred on me the royalty 
of the nations, and they have propagated the memory of my fortunate 
name to the ends of the earth. . . . The great gods have made me happy 
by the constancy of their affection, they have granted me the exercise of 
my sovereignty over all kings. 2 

Other tablets contain a great variety of compositions. There are 
specimens of m ythological stories, fables, proverbs, laws, contracts, 
psalms and deeds of sale, lists of omens and charms, legends of 
prayers. deities and spirits, and speculations in astrology. Not 

the least interesting among these records are the old Accadian and 
Assyrian hymns. Some of these remind us of the hymns of the 
Rig-Veda. Some have the tone of penitential psalms. The fol- 
lowing is one of the best examples : 

my Lord! my sins are many, my trespasses are great; 
And the wrath of the gods has plagued me with disease, 
And with sickness and sorrow. 

1 fainted, but no one stretched forth his hand ; 
I groaned, but no one drew nigh ; 

I cried aloud, but no one heard. 

1 Translation by H. F. Talbot, Records of the Past, vol. i, pp. 7, 3. 

2 Records of the Past, vol. ix, p. 3. 



11 

O Lord ! do not abandon thy servant. 

In the waters of the great storm seize his hand. 

The sins which he has committed, turn thou to righteousness. 1 

The following prayer for a king is interesting both as an ex- 
ample of Assyrian sacred poetry, and as evidence of a belief in 
immortality: 

Length of days, , 

Long- lasting years, 

A strong sword, 

A long life, 

Extended years of glory, 

Pre-eminence among kings, 

Grant ye to the king, my lord, 

Who has given such gifts to his gods ! 

The bounds vast and wide 

Of his empire and of his rule 

May he enlarge and may he complete. 

Holding over all kings supremacy, 

And royalty and empire, 

May he attain to gray hairs and old age ; 

And after the life of these days, 

In the feasts of the silver mountain, 2 

The heavenly courts, 

The abode of blessedness, 

And in the light of the Happy Fields, 

May he dwell a life eternal, holy, 

Iu the presence of the gods 

Who inhabit Assyria. 3 

The following Chaldean account of the Creation is a translation, 
by H. F. Talbot, of the first and fifth Creation Tablets, Chaldean ac- 
which are preserved, though in a mutilated condition, JfoJ^gfJf Crea " 
in the British Museum : 

From the First Tablet. 
When the upper region was not yet called heaven, 
And the lower region was not yet called earth, 
And the abyss of Hades had not yet opened its arms, 
Then the chaos of waters gave birth to all of them, 
And the waters were gathered into one place. 
No men yet dwelt together; no animals yet wandered about; 

1 Records of the Past, vol. iii, p. 136. 

2 The Assyrian Olympus. The epithet silver was doubtless suggested by some 
snowy inaccessible peak, the supposed dwelling-place of the gods. 

3 Translated by Talbot, Records of the Past, vol. iii, pp. 133, 134. 



12 

None of the gods had yet been born, 

Their names were not spoken; their attributes were not known. 

Then the eldest of the gods, 

Lakhmu and Lakhamu were born, 

And grew up. . . . * 

Assur and Kissur were born next, 

And lived through long periods. 

Anu. . . . 2 

From the Fifth Tablet. 

He constructed dwellings for the great gods. 

He fixed up constellations, whose figures were like animals. 

He made the year. Into four quarters he divided it. 

Twelve months he established, with their constellations, three by 

three. 
And for days of the year he appointed festivals. 
He made dwellings for the planets; for their rising and setting. 
And that nothing should go amiss, and that the course of none should 

be retarded, 
He placed with them the dwellings of Bel and Hea. 
He opened great gates on every side; 

He made strong the portals, on the left hand and on the right. 
In the centre he placed luminaries. 
The moon he appointed to rule the night, 
And to wander through the night, until the dawn of day. 
Every month without fail he made holy assembly days. 
In the beginning of the month, at the rising of the night, 
It shot forth its horns to illuminate the heavens. 
On the seventh day he appointed a holy day, 
And to cease from all business he commanded. 
Then arose the sun in the horizon of heaven in (glory). 3 

The mention here made of the seventh day as a holy day is im- 
portant to the biblical theologian. "It has been known for some 
time," says Talbot, "that the Babylonians observed the Sabbath 
with considerable strictness. On that day the king was not allowed 
to take a drive in his chariot ; various meats were forbidden to be 
eaten, and there were a number of other minute restrictions. But 
it was not known that they believed the Sabbath to have been or- 
dained at the Creation. I have found, however, since this transla- 
tion of the fifth tablet was completed, that Mr. Sayce has recently 
published a similar opinion." 

1 Lacunae. 2 The rest of this tablet is lost. 

8 Records of the Past, vol. ix, pp. 117, 118. Compare the translation and comments 
of George Smith, Chaldaean Account of Genesis. New York, 1876. New Edition, 
revised, 1880. 



13 

The following Accadian poem is supposed to be an ancient tradi- 
tion of the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah. Mr. 

,.-.._ . , Accadian le- 

bayce, whose translation is here given, observes that gend of Sodom 

"it seems merely a fragment of a legend, in which andGomorratl - 
the names of the cities were probably given, and an explanation 
afforded of the mysterious personage, who, like Lot, appears to 
have escaped destruction. It must not be forgotten that the cam- 
paign of ChedOrlaomer and his allies was directed against Sodom 
and the other cities of the plain, so that the existence of the legend 
among the Accadians is not so surprising as might appear at first 
sight." 

An overthrow from the midst of the deep there came. 

The fated punishment from the midst of heaven descended. 

A storm like a plummet the earth (overwhelmed). 

To the four winds the destroying flood like fire did burn. 

The inhabitants of the cities it had caused to be tormented ; their bodies 

it consumed. 
In city and country it spread death, and the flames as they rose overthrew. 
Freeman and slave were equal, and the high places it filled. 
In heaven and earth like a thunder-storm it had rained; a prey it made. 
A place of refuge the gods hastened to, and in a throng collected. 
Its mighty (onset) they fled from, and like a garment it concealed (mankind). 
They (feared), and death (overtook them). 
(Their) feet and hands (it embraced). 
Their body it consumed. 

... a the city, its foundation, it defiled. 

... * in breath, his mouth he filled. 
As for this man, a loud voice was raised; the mighty lightning flash de- 
scended. 
During the day it flashed ; grievously (it fell). 8 

Similar to the above in general tone and character are the cune- 
iform accounts of the Deluge and the Tower of Babel. They are 
especially valuable in showing how the traditions of most ancient 
events were preserved among the scattered nations, and became 
modified in the course of ages. Notably inferior are these poetic 
legends to the calm and stately narratives of the book of Genesis, 
but they are, nevertheless, to be greatly prized. Were Assyriolo- 
gists to gather up, classify, and arrange in proper order the relig- 
ious records of ancient Assyria and Babylonia, it would be seen 
that these hoary annals and hymns of departed nations furnish a 
sacred literature second in interest and value to none of the bibles 
of the Gentiles. 

1 Lacunas. 2 Records of the Past, vol. si, pp. 115-118. 



u 



The Veda. 

The word Veda means knowledge, and is the Sanskrit equivalent 
of the Greek olda, I know. It is often used to denote the entire 
body of Hindu sacred literature, which, according to the Brahmans, 
contains pre-eminently the knowledge which is important and wor- 
Generai bar ^y to be known. But the Vedas proper exist chiefly 
acter of the in the form of lyrical poetry, and consist of four dis- 
tinct collections known as the Rig- Veda, the Sama- 
Veda, the Yajur-Veda, and the Atharva-Veda. These hymns are 
called Mantras, as distinguished from the prose annotations and 
disquisitions (Brahmanas), which were subsequently added to them. 
They are written in a dialect much older than the classical San- 
skrit, and are allowed on all hands to be among the most ancient 
and important monuments of literature extant in any nation or 
language. The four collections differ much, however, in age and 
value. The Rig- Veda is the oldest and most important, and con- 
sists of one thousand and twenty-eight hymns. Nearly half the 
hymns are addressed to either Indra, the god of light, or Agni, the 
god of fire. According to Professor Whitney, it "is doubtless a 
historical collection, prompted by a desire to treasure up complete, 
and preserve from further corruption, those ancient and inspired 
songs which the Indian nation had brought with them, as their 
most precious possession, from the earlier seats of the race." ' The 
Sama-Veda is a liturgical collection, consisting largely of hymns 
from the Rig- Veda, but arranged for ritual purposes. The Yajur- 
Veda is of a similar character, and consists of various formulas 
in prose and verse arranged for use at sacrificial services. The 
Atharva-Veda is the work of a later period, and never attained in 
India a rank equal to that of the other Vedas. In fact, says Max 
Max Mailer's ^^ er > "^ or tracing the earliest growth of religious 
views of the ideas in India, the only important, the only real Veda, 
Kig-veda. ig the R ig _y eda> The other so . ca iied Vedas, which 

deserve the name of Veda no more than the Talmud deserves the 
name of Bible, contain chiefly extracts from the Rig- Veda, together 
with sacrificial formulas, charms, and incantations, many of them, 
no doubt, extremely curious, but never likely to interest any one 
except the Sanskrit scholar by profession." 2 

The same distinguished scholar elsewhere observes : " The Veda 
has a twofold interest ; it belongs to the history of the world and 

1 Oriental and Linguistic Studies, p. 13. New York, 1873. 

2 Chips from a German Workshop, vol. i, p. 8. 



13 

to the history of India. In the history of the world the Veda fills 
a gap which no literary work in any other language could fill. 
It carries us back to times of which we have no records anywhere, 
and gives us the very words of a generation of men of whom other- 
wise we could form but the vaguest estimate by means of conjec- 
tures and inferences. As long as man continues to take an interest 
in the history of his race, and as long as we collect in libraries and 
museums the relics of former ages, the first place in that long row 
of books which contains the records of the Aryan branch of man- 
kind will belong forever to the Rig- Veda." * 

Confining our observations, therefore, to the Rig- Veda, we note 

that it is in substance a vast book of psalms. Its one 

i i ^ --I-I-/7V/. • The Rig- Veda 

thousand and twenty-eight lyrics (suktas), of various a vast book of 

length, are divided into ten books {mandalas, circles), Psalms - 
and together constitute a work about eight times larger than the 
one hundred and fifty Psalms of the Old Testament. The first 
book is composed of one hundred and ninety-one hymns, which are 
ascribed to some fifteen different authors {rishis). The second 
book contains forty-three hymns, all of which are attributed to 
Gritsamada and his family. The next five books are also ascribed 
each to a single author or his family, and vary in the number of 
their hymns from sixty-two to one hundred and four. The eighth 
book has ninety-two hymns, attributed to a great num- variety of au« 
ber of different authors, a majority of whom are of the th0T3 ' 
race of Kanva. The ninth book is also ascribed to various authors, 
and has one hundred and fourteen hymns, all of which are addressed 
to Soma as a god. " The name Soma," says Grassmann, " is derived 
from a root, su, which originally meant ' to beget,' 'to produce,' 
but in the Rig- Veda is applied altogether to the extracting and 
pressing of the plant used for the preparation of soma, and the 
soma itself therefore meant originally the juice obtained by this 
procedure." 2 The tenth book, like the first, contains one hundred 
and ninety-one hymns ; but they wear a different style, breathe a 
different spirit, and appear to belong to a much later period. " We 
find," says Grassmann, "in this, as in the first book, songs belong- 
ing to the springtime of vedic poesy, but also songs belonging to a 
time not very remote, as the time of the most recent period of vedic 
lyrics, such as presents itself to us in the Atharva-Veda." 3 

1 History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature. Second Edition, p. 63. Lond., 1860. 

2 Grassmann's Rig- Veda. Metrical Version in German, with Critical and Explan- 
atory Annotations (2 vols. Lpz., 18*76, 18V7). Preface to Ninth Book, vol. ii, 
p. 183. 

3 Rig-Veda. Preface to Tenth Book, vol. ii, p. 288. 



16 

Our limits will allow us to present only a few specimens, but 
specimens of these will suffice to show the general character and 
vedic Hymns. st yi e f t h e ^ est Rig.y e da hymns. The following is 
Max Mtiller's translation of the fifty-third hymn of the first book, 
and is addressed to Indra : 

1. Keep silence well! we offer praises to the great Indra in the house of 
the sacrificer. Does he find treasure for those who are like sleepers? 
Mean praise is not valued among the munificent. 

2. Thou art the giver of horses, Indra, thou art the giver of cows, the 
giver of corn, the strong lord of wealth ; the old guide of man, disappoint- 
ing no desires, a friend to friends: — to him we address this song. 

3. O powerful Indra, achiever of many works, most brilliant god— all 
this wealth around here is known to be thine alone : take from it, conqueror, 
bring it hither ! do not stint the desire of the worshipper who longs for 
thee! 

4. On these days thou art gracious, and on these nights, keeping off the 
enemy from our cows and from our stud. Tearing the fiend night after 
night with the help of Indra, let us rejoice in food, freed from haters. 

5. Let us rejoice, Indra, in treasure and food, in wealth of manifold de- 
light and splendor. Let us rejoice in the blessing of the gods, which gives 
us the strength of offspring, gives us cows first and horses. 

6. These draughts inspired thee, O lord of the brave ! these were vigour, 
these libations, in battles, when for the sake of the poet, the sacrificer, 
thou struckest down irresistibly ten thousands of enemies. 

7. From battle to battle thou advancest bravely, from town to town thou 
destroyest all this with might, when thou, Indra, with Kami as thy friend, 
struckest down from afar the deceiver Namuki. 

8. Thou hast slain Karnaga and Parnaya with the brightest spear of 
Atithigva. Without a helper thou didst demolish the hundred cities of 
Vangrida, which were besieged by Rigisvan. 

9. Thou hast felled down with the chariot-wheel these twenty kings of 
men, who had attacked the friendless Susravas, and gloriously the sixty 
thousand and ninety-nine forts. 

10. Thou, Indra, hast succoured Susravas with thy succours, Turvayana 
with thy protections. Thou hast made Kutsa, Atithigva, and Ayu subject 
to this mighty youthful king. 

11. We who in future, protected by the gods, wish to be thy most 
blessed friends, we shall praise thee, blessed by thee with offspring, and 
enjoying henceforth a longer life. 1 

The following is a translation, by W. D. Whitney, of the eight- 
eenth hymn of the tenth book. It furnishes a vivid portraiture of 
the proceedings of an ancient Hindu burial, and holds even at the 
present day an important place among the funeral ceremonies of the 
Hindus. The officiating priest thus speaks : 

1 Chips from a German Workshop, vol. i, pp. 30-33. 



17 

1. Go forth, O Death, upon a distant pathway, 

one that's thine own, not that the gods do travel; 
I speak to thee who eyes and ears possessest ; 

harm not our children, harm thou not our heroes. 

2. Ye who death's foot have clogged 1 ere ye came hither, 

your life and vigour longer yet retaining, 
Sating yourselves with progeny and riches, 

clean be ye now, and purified, ye offerers ! 

3. These have come here, not of the dead, but living; 

our worship of the gods hath been propitious ; 
We've onward gone to dancing and to laughter, 

our life and vigour longer yet retaining. 2 

4. This fix I as protection for the living; 3 

may none of them depart on that same errand; 
Long may they live, a hundred numerous autumns, 

'twixt death and them a mountain interposing. 

5. As day succeeds to day in endless series, 

as seasons happily move on with seasons, 
As each that passes lacks not its successor, 

so do thou make their lives move on, Creator! 

6. Ascend to life, old age your portion making, 

each after each, advancing in due order; 4 
May Twashter, skilful fashioner, propitious, 

cause that you here enjoy a long existence. 

7. These women here, not widows, blessed wuth husbands, 

may deck themselves with ointment and with perfume; 
Unstained by tears, adorned, untouched with sorrow, 
the wives may first ascend unto the altar. 

8. Go up unto the world of life, O woman ! 

thou liest by one whose soul is fled ; come hither! 
To him who grasps thy hand, 5 a second husband, 

thou art as wife to spouse become related. 

1 Allusion to the custom of attaching a clog to the foot of the corpse, as if thereby 
to secure the attendants at the burial from harm. 

2 The friends of the deceased seem to have no idea of soon sharing his fate ; they 
desire to banish the thought of death. 

3 The officiating priest drew a circle and set a stone between it and the grave, to 
symbolize the barrier which he would fain establish between the living and the dead. 

4 Addressed to the attendants, who hereupon left their places about the bier, and 
went up into the circle marked off for the living. First the men went up, then the 
wives, and finally the widow. 

6 The person who led the widow away was usually a brother-in-law, or a foster child. 



18 

9. The bow from out the dead man's hand now taking, 1 

that ours may be the glory, honour, prowess — 
Mayest thou there, we here, rich in retainers, 

vanquish our foes and them that plot against us. 

10. Approach thou now the lap of earth, thy mother, 

the wide-extending earth, the ever-kindly ; 
A maiden soft as wool to him who comes with gifts, 

she shall protect thee from destruction's bosom. 

11. Open thyself, O earth, and press not heavily; 

be easy of access and of approach to him ; 
As mother with her robe her child, 

so do thou cover him, O earth ! 

12. May earth maintain herself thus opened wide for him; 

a thousand props shall give support about him ; 
And may those mansions ever drip with fatness; 

may they be there for evermore his refuge. 

13. Forth from about thee thus I build away the ground; 

as I lay down this clod may I receive no harm; 
This pillar may the Fathers here maintain for thee ; 

may Yama there provide for thee a dwelling. 

We add a single specimen more, a metrical version of the one 
hundred and twenty-ninth hymn of the tenth book, which is espe- 
cially interesting as being full of profound speculation. "In judg- 
ing it," says Max Miiller, " we should bear in mind that it was not 
written by a gnostic or by a pantheistic philosopher, but by a poet 
who felt all these doubts and problems as his own, without any 
wish to convince or to startle, only uttering what had been weigh- 
ing on his mind, just as later poets would sing the doubts and sor- 
rows of their heart." 

Nor Aught nor Naught existed ; yon bright sky 

Was not, nor heaven's broad woof outstretched above. 

What covered all? what sheltered? what concealed? 

Was it the water's fathomless abyss? 

There was not death — yet was there naught immortal, 

There was no confine betwixt day and night; 

1 Up to the moment of interment a bow was carried in the hand of the deceased. 
This was at last taken away to signify that his life-work was now done, and to others 
remained the glory of conquests. The body was then tenderly committed to the earth. 
Compare Whitney's annotations on this hymn, and his essay on the Vedic Doctrine of 
a Future Life in the Bibliotheca Sacra for April, 1859, and also in his Oriental and 
Linguistic Studies, pp. 46-63. New York, 1873. 



19 

The only One breathed breathless by itself, 
Other than It there nothing since has been. 
Darkness there was, and all at first was veiled 
In gloom profound — an ocean without light — 
The germ that still lay covered in the husk 
Burst forth, one nature, from the fervent heat. 
Then first came love upon it, the new spring 
Of mind — yea, poets in their hearts discerned. 
Pondering, this bond between created things 
And uncreated. Comes this spark from earth 
Piercing and all-pervading, or from heaven? 
Then seeds were sown, and mighty powers arose — 
Nature below, and power and will above — 
Who knows the secret? who proclaimed it here, 
Whence, whence this manifold creation sprang? 
The gods themselves came later into being— 
Who knows from whence this great creation sprang? 
He from whom all this great creation came, 
Whether his will created or was mute, 
The Most High Seer that is in highest heaven, 
He knows it — or perchance even He knows not. 1 

Every discerning reader must note the polytheistic teachings of 

the Yeda. Mr. Hardwick calls attention to this in the following 

remarks: "If we lay aside expressions in the vedic hymns which 

have occasionally transferred the attributes of pow r er 

., J . _ _ . l _ The Vedas are 

and omnipresence to some one elemental deity, as In- mainly poiy- 

dra, for example, and by so doing intimated that, even theistlc - 

in the depths of nature-worship, intuitions pointing to one great and 

all-embracing Spirit could not be extinguished, there are scarcely a 

dozen 'mantras' in the whole collection where the unity of God is 

stated with an adequate amount of firmness and consistency. The 

great mass of those productions either invoke the aid, or deprecate 

the wrath of multitudinous deities, who elsewhere are regarded as 

no more than finite emanations from the 'lord of the creatures;' 

and therefore in the sacred books themselves polytheism was the 

feature ever prominent, and, what is more remarkable, was never 

openly repudiated." 2 

1 Chips from a German Workshop, vol. i, pp. 76, 77. 

2 Christ and other Masters, p. 1 84. Compare Introduction to the several volumes 
of Wilson's Translation of the Rig- Yeda, and Colebrook's Essay on the Vedas, first 
published in the Asiatic Researches, and later in his collected works. Lond., 1873. 
On the translation and interpretation of the Veda, see Muir, in Journal of the Royal 
Asiatic Society (Lond., 1866), and Whitney, in the North American Review (1868); 
also in his Oriental and Linguistic Studies, pp. 100-132. 



20 



The Buddhist Caison. 

Buddhism in India was a revolt from Brahmanism. Its founder 
Life and infiu- was Sakya-muni, sometimes called Gautama, being of 
„nce of sakya- the f am i] y f t h e Sakyas, and the clan of the Gautamas, 

mum, or Bud- •> # j •> _ ? 

ciha. and belonging by birth to the warrior class (Kshatriya). 

Stripping the story of his life of the numerous fables and supersti- 
tious legends of later times, it would appear that this distinguished 
child of the Sakyas grew up a beautiful and accomplished youth, 
but took no interest in the common amusements of the young, and 
gave himself much to solitude and meditation. The problems of 
life and death and human suffering absorbed his inmost being. He 
at length forsook parents and wife and home, and, after years of 
study, penances, and austere self-denial, attained the conviction 
that he must go forth among men as an Enlightener and Kef ormer. 
Max Miiller says: "After long meditations and ecstatic visions, he 
at last imagined that he had arrived at that true knowledge which 
discloses the cause and thereby destroys the fear of all the changes 
inherent in life. It was from the moment when he arrived at this 
knowledge that he claimed the name of Buddha, the Enlightened. 
At that moment we may truly say that the fate of millions of mill- 
ions of human beings trembled in the balance. Buddha hesitated 
for a time whether he should keep his knowledge to himself, or 
communicate it to the world. Compassion for the sufferings of 
man prevailed, and the young prince became the founder of a 
religion which, after more than 2000 years, is still professed by 
455,000,000 of human beings." 1 

Sakya-muni's life, according to the best authorities, extended 
Buddha a Re- over tne latter part of the sixth and the first half of the 
former. fifth cen tury before Christ. He broke with Brahman- 

ism from the first, and pronounced himself against the Vedas, the 
system of caste, and sacrifices. How far Kapila's system of the 
Sankhya philosophy may have been a preparation for Buddhism is a 
question, 2 but that Buddha became a mighty reformer, and that his 
system almost succeeded for a time in overthrowing Brahmanism in 
India, are matters of history. " The human mind in Asia," observes 
J. F. Clarke, "went through the same course of experience after- 
ward repeated in Europe. It protested, in the interest of humanity, 
against the oppression of a priestly caste. Brahmanism, like the 
Church of Rome, established a system of sacramental salvation in 

1 Essay on Buddhism, in Chips from a German Workshop, vol. i, p. 211. 

2 Comp. Hardwick, Christ and other Masters, pp. 147-169 ; and Miiller's Chips from 
a German Workshop, vol. i, pp. 222-226. 



21 

the hands of a sacred order. Buddhism, like Protestantism, re- 
volted, and established a doctrine of individual salvation based on 
personal character. Brahmanism, like the Church of Rome, teaches 
an exclusive spiritualism, glorifying penances and martyrdom, and 
considers the body the enemy of the soul. But Buddhism and 
Protestantism accept nature and its laws, and make a religion of 
humanity as well as of devotion. To such broad statements numer- 
ous exceptions may doubtless be always found, but these are the 
large lines of distinction." 1 

The sacred scriptures of Buddhism are commonly called the 
Tripitaka, which means the "three baskets," or three compilation of 
collections of religious documents. Buddha, like Jesus, the Tripitaka. 
left no written statement of his teachings ; but very soon after his 
death, according to tradition, a great council was called (about 
B. C. 477), at whioh the sayings of the great master were written 
down with care. A hundred years later another council assembled, 
to consider and correct certain deviations from the original faith. 
But it was probably not until a third council, convened by King 
Asoka about B. C. 242, that the Buddhist canon in its present form 
was completed. 2 At that great council King Asoka, "the Indian 
Constantine," admonished the members of the assembly "that what 
had been said by Buddha, that alone was well said;" and at the 
same time he provided for the propagation of Buddhism by mis- 
sionary enterprise. And it is worthy of note that, as Christianity 
originated among the Jews, but has had its chief triumphs among 
the Gentiles, so Buddhism originated among the Hindus, but has 
won most of its adherents among other tribes and nations. 

The Tripitaka, as we now possess it, consists of the Vinaya- 
Pitaka, devoted to ethics and discipline; the Sutra- Contents and 
Pitaka, containing the Sutras, or discourses of Buddha; magnitude of 
and the Abhidharma-Pitaka, which treats of dogmatical tbe Tnpitai:a - 
philosophy and metaphysics. 3 The entire collection constitutes an 
immense body of literature, rivaling in magnitude all that was ever 
included under the title of Veda. It is said to contain 29,368,000 
letters, or more than seven times the number contained in our Eng- 
lish Bible. The Tibetan edition of the Tripitaka fills about three 
hundred and twenty-five folio volumes. The mere titles of the 
divisions, sub-divisions, and chapters of this Buddhist canon would 
cover several pages. The greater portion of this immense litera- 

1 Ten Great Religions, pp. 142, 143. Boston, 1871. 

2 See Oldenberg's Introduction to the Vinaya-Pitaka, and Miiller's Introduction to 
the Dhammapada, in vol. x, of Sacred Books of the East. 

3 Comp. Chapter xviii, of Spence Hardy, Eastern Monachism. Lond., 1850. 



22 

ture, in its most ancient texts, exists as yet only in manuscript. 
But as Buddhism spread and triumphed mightily in southern and 
eastern Asia, its sacred books have been translated into Pali, Bur- 
mese, Siamese, Tibetan, Chinese, and other Asiatic tongues. In 
fact, every important nation or tribe, which has adopted Buddhism, 
appears to have a more or less complete Buddhist literature of its 
own, and the names of the different books and treatises vary accord- 
ing to the languages in which they are extant. 1 Amid the multi- 
plicity of texts and versions it is impossible now to point with con- 
fidence to any authoritative original ; but the form of the canon as 
it exists among the Southern Buddhists, and especially in the Pali 
texts, is esteemed most highly by scholars. 

The fundamental doctrines of Buddhism are few and simple, and, 
Princi ai doc * n sn ^ stance > ma y ^ e briefly stated as consisting of the 
trines of Bud- Four Verities, the Eightfold Path, and the Five Com- 
mandments. The Four sublime Verities are, (1) All ex- 
istence, being subject to change and decay, is evil. (2) The source 
of all this evil and consequent sorrow is desire. (3) Desire and the 
evil which follows it may be made to cease. (4) There is a fixed 
and certain way by which to attain exemption from all evil. The 
Eightfold Path consists of (1) Right Belief, (2) Right Judgment, 
(3) Right Utterance, (4) Right Motives, (5) Right Occupation, 
(6) Right Obedience, (7) Right Memory, and (8) Right Meditation. 
The Five Commandments are, (1) Do not kill; (2) Do not steal; 
(3) Do not lie; (4) Do not become intoxicated; (5) Do not commit 
adultery. There are also five other well-known precepts, which 
have not, however, the grade of the commandments, namely, (1) Do 
not take solid food after noon; (2) Do not visit scenes of amuse- 
ment; (3) Do not use ornaments or perfumery in dress; (4) Do not 
use luxurious beds; (5) Do not accept gold or silver. 8 
specimens of Bud- Tne following passage from the first chapter of the 
dna's discourses. Maha-Parinibbana-Sutta, one of the subdivisions of 
the Sutra-Pitaka, is a specimen of the discourses of Buddha : 

And the Blessed One arose, and went to the Service Hall; and when he 
was seated, he addressed the brethren, and said : 

" I will teach you, O mendicants, seven conditions of the welfare of a 
community. Listen well and attend, and I will speak." 

1 Thus the Sanskrit name Tripitaka becomes Tipitaka and Pitakattaya in Pali, and Tun- 
pitaka in Singhalese. Buddhism itself becomes Foism in China, and Lamaism in Thibet 

2 For an extensive presentation of the doctrines and usages of Buddhism, see Spence 
Hardy, Eastern Monachism ; also his Manual of Buddhism, New Edition, Lond., 1 S80. 
Edwin Arnold has beautifully expressed in poetical form the leading doctrines of 
Buddha, in the eighth book of his Light of Asia. 



23 

"Even so, Lord," said the Brethren, in assent, to the Blessed One; and 
he spake as follows : 

" So long, O mendicants, as the brethren meet together in full and fre- 
quent assemblies — so long as they meet together in concord, and rise in 
concord, and carry out in concord the duties of the order — so lono- as the 
brethren shall establish nothing that has not been already prescribed and 
abrogate nothing that has been already established, and act in accordance 
with the rules of the order as now laid down — so long as the brethren hon- 
our and esteem and revere and support the elders of experience and long- 
standing, the fathers and leaders of the order, and hold it a point of duty 
to hearken to their words — so long as the brethren fall not under the influ- 
ence of that craving which, springing up within them, would give rise to 
renewed existence— so long as the brethren delight in a life of solitude— so 
long as the brethren so train then- minds that good and holy men shall 
come to them, and those who have come shall dwell at ease — so long may 
the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper. 

"So long as these seven conditions shall continue to exist among the 
brethren, so long as they are well instructed in these conditions, so long 
may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper." 

" Other seven conditions of welfare will I teach you, O brethren. Listen 
well, and attend, and I will speak." 

And on their expressing their assent, he spake as follows: 

" So long as the brethren shall not engage in, or be fond of, or be con- 
nected with business — so long as the brethren shall not be in the habit of, 
or be fond of, or be partakers in idle talk — so long as the brethren shall 
not be addicted to, or be fond of, or indulge in slothfulness — so long as the 
brethren shall not frequent, or be fond of, or indulge in society — so long 
as the brethren shall neither have, nor fall under the influence of, sinful 
desires— so long as the brethren shall not become the friends, companions, 
or intimates of sinners — so long as the brethren shall not come to a stop on 
their way [to Nirvana] because they have attained to any lesser thing— so 
long may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper. 

" So long as these conditions shall continue to exist among the brethren, 
so long as they are instructed in these conditions, so long may the brethren 
be expected not to decline, but to prosper." 

" Other seven conditions of welfare will I teach you, O brethren. Listen 
well, and attend, and I will speak." 

And on their expressing their assent, he spake as follows: 

" So long as the brethren shall be full of faith, modest in heart, afraid 
of sin, full of learning, strong in energy, active in mind, and full of wis- 
dom, so long may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper, 

" So long as these conditions shall continue to exist among the brethren, 
so long as they are instructed in these conditions, so long may the brethren 
be expected not to decline, but to prosper." 

" Other seven conditions of welfare will I teach you, O brethren. Listen 
well, and attend, and I will speak." 

And on their expressing their assent, he spake as follows: 

w So long as the brethren shall exercise themselves in the sevenfold higher 



24: 

wisdom, that is to say, in mental activity, search after truth, energy, joy, 
peace, earnest contemplation, and equanimity of mind, so long may the 
brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper. 

" So long as these conditions shall continue to exist among the brethren, 
so long as they are instructed in these conditions, so long may the brethren 
be expected not to decline, but to prosper." 

" Other seven conditions of welfare will I teach you, O brethren. Listen 
well, and attend, and I will speak." 

And on their expressing their assent, he spake as follows : 

" So long as the brethren shall exercise themselves in the sevenfold per- 
ception due to earnest thought, that is to say, the perception of iraperma- 
nency, of non-individuality, of corruption, of the danger of sin, of sanctifica- 
tion, of purity of heart, of Nirvana, so long may the brethren be expected 
not to decline, but to prosper. 

" So long as these conditions shall continue to exist among the brethren, 
so long as they are instructed in these conditions, so long may the brethren 
be expected not to decline, but to prosper." 

" Six conditions of welfare will I teach you, O brethren. Listen well, 
and attend, and I will speak." 

And on their expressing their assent, he spake as follows: 

" So long as the brethren shall persevere in kindness of action, speech, 
and thought among the saints, both in public and in private — so long as 
they shall divide without partiality, and share in common with the up- 
right and the holy, all such things as they receive in accordance with the 
just provisions of the order, down even to the mere contents of a begging 
bowl — so long as the brethren shall live among the saints in the practice, 
both in public and in private, of those virtues which (unbroken, intact, un- 
spotted, unblemished) are productive of freedom, and praised by the wise ; 
which are untarnished by the desire of future life, or by the belief in the 
efficacy of outward acts; and which are conducive to high and holy 
thoughts — so long as the brethren shall live among the saints, cherishing, 
both in public and in private, that noble and saving faith which leads to 
the complete destruction of the sorrow of him who acts according to it — so 
long may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper. 

" So long as these six conditions shall continue to exist among the 
brethren, so long as they are instructed in these six conditions, so long 
may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper." 

And while the Blessed One stayed there at Ragagaha on the Vulture's 
Peak he held that comprehensive religious talk with the brethren on the 
nature of upright conduct, and of earnest contemplation, and of intelli- 
gence. "Great is the fruit, great the advantage of earnest contemplation 
when set round with upright conduct. Great is the fruit, great the advan- 
tage of intellect when set round with earnest contemplation. The mind 
set round with intelligence is freed from the great evils, that is to say, from 
sensuality, from individuality, from delusion, and from ignorance." 1 

1 Buddhist Suttas, translated from Pali, by T. W. Rhys Davids, pp. 6-11, vol. xi, of 
Sacred Books of the East. Oxford, 1881. 



25 

The following is the twentieth chapter of the Dhammapada, an- 
other subdivision of the Sutra-Pitaka : 

The best of ways is the eightfold; the best of truths the four words; the 
best of virtues passionlessness ; the best of men he who has eyes to see. 

This is the way, there is no other that leads to the purifying of intelli- 
gence. Go on this way ! Everything else is the deceit of Mara (the tempter). 

If you go on this way, you will make an end of pain! The way was 
preached by me, when I had understood the removal of the thorns (in the 
flesh). 

You yourself must make an effort. The Tathagatas (Buddhas) are only 
preachers. The thoughtful who enter the way are freed from the bondage 
of Mara. 

"All created things perish," he who knows and sees this becomes passive 
in pain; this is the way to purity, 

"All created things are grief and pain," he who knows and sees this be- 
comes passive in pain ; this is the way that leads to purity. 

"All forms are unreal," he who knows and sees this becomes passive in 
pain ; this is the way that leads to purity. 

He who does not rouse himself when it is time to rise, who, though 
young and strong, is full of sloth, whose will and thought are weak, that 
lazy and idle man will never find the way to knowledge. 

"Watching his speech, well restrained in mind, let a man never commit 
any wrong with his body! Let a man keep these three roads of action 
clear, and he will achieve the way which is taught by the wise. 

Through zeal knowledge is gotten, through lack of zeal knowledge is 
lost; let a man who knows this double path of gain and loss thus place 
himself that knowledge may grow. 

Cut down the whole forest (of lust), not a tree only! Danger comes out 
of the forest (of lust). When you have cut down both the forest (of lust) 
and its undergrowth, then, Bhikshus, you will be rid of the forest and free i 

So long as the love of man toward women, even the smallest, is not de- 
stroyed, so long is his mind in bondage, as the calf that drinks milk is to 
its mother. 

Cut out the love of self, like an autumn lotus, with thy hand ! Cherish 
the road of peace. Nirvana has been shown by Sugata (Buddha). 

"Here I shall dwell in the rain, here in winter and summer," thus the 
fool meditates, and does not think of his death. 

Death comes and carries off that man, praised for his children and flocks, 
his mind distracted, as a flood carries off a sleeping village. 

Sons are no help, nor a father, nor relations; there is no help from kins- 
folk for one whom death has seized. 

A wise and good man who knows the meaning of this, should quickly 
clear the way that leads to Nirvana. 1 

1 The Dhammapada, translated by F. Max Miiller, pp. 67-69, vol. x, of Sacred Books 
of the East. Oxford, 1881. Published also along with Rogers' translation of Buddha- 
ghosha's Parables (Lond., 1810), and Miiller's Lectures on the Science of Religion. 
New York, 1872. 



20 



Chinese Sacred Books. 

Three diverse religious systems prevail in China — Buddhism, 
Three religions Taoism, and Confucianism, each of which has a vast 
of china. multitude of adherents. The sacred books of the. first 

named consist of translations of the Buddhist canon from various 
languages of India, principally, however, from the Sanskrit, and 
need no separate notice here. 1 The great book of Taoism is the 
Tao-teh-King, a production of the celebrated philosopher Laotsze, 
who was born about six hundred years before the Christian era. 
The sacred books of Confucianism are commonly known as the five 
King and the four Shu. 

The Tao-teh-King is scarcely entitled to the name of a sacred 
The Tao-ten- book. It is rather a philosophical treatise, by an acute 
mag. speculative mind, and resembles some of the subtle por- 

tions of Plato's dialogues. It is about the length of the book of 
Ecclesiastes, to which it also bears some resemblance. But it is de- 
nied, on high authority, that there is any real connexion between 
Taoism as a religion now prevalent in China and this book of 
Laotsze. 2 The Tao-teh-King has been divided into eighty-one 
short chapters, and is devoted to the inculcation and praise of what 
the author calls his Tao. What all this word is designed to rep- 
resent is very difficult, if not impossible, to determine. In the In- 
troduction to his translation of the work, Chalmers says : " I have 
thought it better to leave the word Tao untranslated, both because 
The meaning it has given the name to the sect (the Taoists), and be- 
of Tao. cause no English word is its exact equivalent. Three 

terms suggest themselves — the Way, Reason, and the Word ; but 
they are all liable to objection. Were we guided by etymology, 
'the Way,' would come nearest to the original, and in one or two 
passages the idea of a way seems to be in the term; but this is too 
materialistic to serve the purpose of a translation. ' Reason,' again, 
seems to be more like a quality or attribute of some conscious being 
than Tao is. I would translate it by 'the Word,' in the sense of 
the Logos, but this would be like settling the question which I wish 
to leave open, viz., what amount of resemblance there is between 
the Logos of the New Testament and this Tao, which is its nearest 
representative in Chinese. In our version of the New Testament 

1 The extent of this literature may be seen in Beal's Catena of Buddhist Scriptures 
from the Chinese. Lond., 18*71. 

2 See Legge, Lectures on the Religions of China. Lecture 3d, on Taoism as a Re- 
ligion and a Philosophy. New York, 1881. 



27 

in Chinese we have in the first chapter of John, ' In the beginning 
was Tcio? etc." ! 

Others have sought by other terms to express the idea of Tao. 
It has been called the Supreme Reason, the Universal Soul, the 
Eternal Idea, the ISTameless Yoid, Mother of being, and Lao tsze's ac- 
Essence of things. The following is from Laotsze him- count of Ta0 - 
self, and one of the best specimens of his book, being the whole of 
chapter twenty-fifth, as translated by Chalmers : 

There was something chaotic in nature which existed before heaven and 
earth. It was still. It was void. It stood alone and was not changed. 
It pervaded everywhere and was not endangered. It may be regarded as 
the mother of the universe. I know not its name, but give it the title of 
Tao. If I am forced to make a name for it, I say it is Great ; being great, 
I say that it passes away ; passing away, I say that it is far off ; being far 
off, I say that it returns. Now Tao is great; heaven is great; earth is 
great; a king is great. In the universe there are four greatnesses, and a 
king is one of them. Man takes his law from the earth ; the earth takes its 
law from heaven ; heaven takes its law from Tao ; and Tao takes its law from 
what it is in itself. 

The moral teachings of the book may be seen in chapters sixty- 
third and sixty-seventh, which are thus translated by Legge : 

(It is the way of Tao) not to act from any personal motive; to conduct 
affairs without feeling the trouble of them; to taste without being aw r are 
of the flavour: to account the great as small and the small as great; to 
recompense injury with kindness. 

(The follower of Tao) anticipates things that would become difficult 
while they are easy, and does things that would become great while they 
are little. The difficult things in the world arise from what are easy, and 
the great things from what are small. Thus it is that the sage never does 
what is great, and therefore can accomplish the greatest things. 

He who assents lightly will be found to keep but little faith. He who 
takes many things easily is sure to meet with many difficulties. Hence the 
sage sees difficulty in (what seem) easy things, and therefore never has any 
difficulties. 

All in the world say that my Tao is great, but that I seem to be inferior 
to others. Now it is just this greatness which makes me seem inferior to 
others. Those who are deemed equal to others have long been — small men. 

But there are three precious things which I prize and hold fast. The 
first is gentle compassion ; the second is economy ; the third is (humility), 
not presuming to take precedence in the world. With gentle compassion 
I can be brave. "With economy I can be liberal. Not presuming to claim 

1 The Speculations on Metaphysics, Polity, and Morality, of " the Old Philosopher," 
Laotsze ; translated from the Chinese, with an Introduction by John Chalmers, A.M., 
pp. xi, xii. Lond., 186S. 



28 

precedence in the world, I can make myself a vessel fit for the most distin« 
guished services. Now-a-days they give up gentle compassion, and culti- 
vate (mere physical) courage ; they give up economy, and (try to be) lavish 
(without it) ; they give up being last, and seek to be first : — of all which 
the end is death. Gentle compassion is sure to overcome in fight, and to 
be firm in maintaining its own. Heaven will save its possessor, protecting 
him by his gentleness. 1 

It has been disputed whether the Tao-teh-King acknowledges 
Leaves the per- the existence of a personal God. Professor Douglas 
of n God X dc^ declares tnat Laotsze knew nothing of such a being, 
fui. and that the whole tenor of his philosophy antagonizes 

such a belief. Legge, on the other hand, affirms that the Tao-teh- 
King does recognize the existence of God, but contains no direct 
religious teaching. Laotsze's Taoism, he observes, is the exhibition 
of a way or method of living which men should cultivate as the 
highest and purest development of their nature. It has served as 
a discipline of mind and life for multitudes, leading some to with- 
draw entirely from the busy world, and others to struggle earnestly 
to keep themselves from the follies and passions of reckless and 
ambitious men. The highest moral teaching of Laotsze is found in 
the chapter sixty-third, quoted above, in which he says that Tao 
prompts " to recompense injury with kindness." In this particular 
he surpassed Confucius, whose great glory it was to enunciate, in 
negative form, the golden rule, "What you do not want done to 
yourself, do not do to others." Confucius confessed that he did 
not always keep his own rule, much less could he adopt the loftier 
precept of Laotsze, but said rather, " Recompense injury with jus- 
tice, and return good for good." a 

Far more extensive and important, however, taken as a whole, 
Confucius and are the sacred books of Confucianism, which is par ex- 
cwnese a S? cellmce tne religion of the Chinese Empire. But Con- 
ures. fucius was not the founder of the religion which ha3 

become attached to his name. He claimed merely to have studied 
deeply into antiquity, and to be a transmitter and teacher of the 
records and worship of the past. " It is an error," says Legge, 
" to suppose that he compiled the historical documents, poems, and 
other ancient books from various works existing in his time. Por- 
tions of the oldest works had already perished. His study of those 
that remained, and his exhortations to his disciples also to study 
them, contributed to their preservation. What he wrote or said 
about their meaning should be received by us with reverence ; but 

1 Lectures on the Religions of China, pp. 222-224. 
9 Comp. Legge, Ibid., pp. 143 and passim. 



29 

if all the works which he handled had come down to us entire, we 
should have been, so far as it is possible for foreigners to be, in the 
same position as he was for learning the ancient religion of his 
country. Our text-books would be the same as his. Unfortunate- 
ly most of the ancient books suffered loss and injury after Confu- 
cius had passed from the stage of life. We have reason, however, 
to be thankful that we possess so many and so much of them. Xo 
other literature, comparable to them for antiquity, has come down 
to us in such a state of preservation." ! 

The five King are known respectively as the Shu, the Shih, the 
Yi, the Li Ki, and the Khun Khiu. 2 The name King, Names of the 
which means a web of cloth, or the warp which keeps fiYe mn s- 
the threads in place, came into use in the time of the Han dynasty, 
about B. C. 200, and was applied by the scholars of this period to 
the most valuable ancient books, which were regarded as having a 
sort of canonical authority. 

The Shu King is a book of historical documents, somewhat re- 
sembling the various historical portions of the Old 
Testament, and is believed to be the oldest of all the The Shu King ' 
Chinese books. Its contents relate to a period extending over sev- 
enteen centuries, from about B. C. 2357 to B. C. 627. It commences 
with an account of Yao, the most venerable of the ancient kings, of 
whom it is written: "He was reverential, intelligent, accomplished, 
and thoughtful, — naturally and without effort. He was sincerely 
courteous, and capable of all complaisance. The bright influence 
of these qualities was felt through the four quarters of the land, 
and reached to heaven above and earth beneath. He made the 
able and virtuous distinguished, and thence proceeded to the love 
of all in the nine classes of his kindred, who thus became harmoni- 
ous. He also regulated and polished the j)eople of his domain, who 
all became brightly intelligent. Finally, he united and harmonized 
the myriad states; and so the black-haired people were transformed. 
The result was universal concord." 

The Shu King is about equal in extent to the two books of 
Chronicles, and is divided into five parts, w T hich are designated re- 
spectively, the books of Thang, Yu, Hsia, Shang, and Kau. These 
are the names of so many different ancient dynasties which ruled in 
China, and the several books consist of the annals, speeches, counsels, 
and proclamations of the great kings and ministers of the ancients. 

1 Preface to his translation of the Shu King in vol. iii of the Sacred Books of the 
East, as edited by Max Muller. 

2 We here adopt the orthography followed by Legge in his translations for the Sa- 
cred Books of the East. 



30 

The following passage is one of the most favourable specimens, and 
illustrates the tone and character of Chinese morality, and their 
most popular conceptions of virtue. It is from the third book 
of Part II, which is entitled "The Counsels of Kao-yao." Kao- 
yao was the minister of crime under the reign of the great Emperor 
Shun (about 2300 B. C), and is celebrated as a model administrator 
of justice : 

Kao-yao said, " O ! there are in all nine virtues to be discovered in con- 
duct, and when we say that a man possesses (any) virtue, that is as much 
as to say he does such and such things." Yu asked, "What (are the nine 
virtues)?" Kao-yao replied, "Affability combined with dignity; mildness 
combined with firmness; bluntness combined with respectfulness; aptness 
for government combined with reverent caution; docility combined with 
boldness ; straightforwardness combined with gentleness ; an easy negli- 
gence combined with discrimination; boldness combined with sincerity; 
and valour combined with righteousness. (When these qualities are) dis- 
played, and that continuously, have we not the good (officer)? When there 
is a daily display of three (of these) virtues, their possessor could early and 
late regulate and brighten the clan (of which he was made chief). When 
there is a daily severe and reverent cultivation of six of them, their pos- 
sessor could brilliantly conduct the affairs of the state (with which he was 
invested). When (such men) are all received and advanced, the possessors 
of those nine virtues will be employed in (the public) service. The men 
of a thousand and men of a hundred will be in their offices; the various 
ministers will emulate one another; all the officers will accomplish their 
duties at the proper times, observant of the five seasons (as the several 
elements predominate in them), — and thus their various duties will be fully 
accomplished. Let not (the Son of Heaven) set to the holders of states the 
example of indolence or dissoluteness. . Let him be wary and fearful (re- 
membering that) in one day or two days there may occur ten thousand 
springs of things. Let him not have his various officers cumberers of their 
places. The work is Heaven's ; men must act for it ! " 

A passage in Part V, Book 4, thus enumerates the five sources 
of happiness, and the six extreme evils : 

The first is long life ; the second, riches ; the third, soundness of body 
and serenity of mind ; the fourth, the love of virtue ; and the fifth, fulfilling 
to the end the will of Heaven. Of the six extreme evils, the first is mis- 
fortune shortening life; the second, sickness; the third, distress of mind; 
the fourth, poverty; the fifth, wickedness; the sixth, weakness. 

The Shih King is a book of poetry, and contains three hundred 

. and five pieces, commonly called odes. It is the psalter 

of the Chinese bible, and consists of ballads relating to 

customs and events of Chinese antiquity, and songs and hymns to 



31 

be sung on great state occasions and in connexion with sacrificial 
services. 1 The following is a fair example of the odes used in con- 
nexion with the worship of ancestors. A young king, feeling his 
responsibilities, would fain follow the example of his father, and 
prays to him for help : 

I take counsel, at the beginning of my rule, 
How I cau follow the example of my shrined father. 
Ah ! far-reaching were his plans, 
And I am not yet able to carry them out. 
However, I endeavour to reach to them, 
My continuation of them will still be all-deflected. 
I am a little child, 

Unequal to the many difficulties of the state. 
Having taken his place, I will look for him to go up 

and come down in the court, 
To ascend and descend in the house. 
Admirable art thou, O great Father; 
Condescend to preserve and enlighten me. 8 

The Yi King is commonly called "the Book of Changes," from 
its supposed illustrations of the onward course of nature 
and the changing customs of the world. 3 It contains 
eight trigrams, ascribed to Fuhsi, the mythical founder of the 
Chinese nation, and hence some have believed it to be the oldest of 
all the Chinese scriptures. But according to Legge, "not a single 
character in the Yi is older than the twelfth century B. C. The 
text of it, not taking in the appendices of Confucius, consists of 
two portions — from king Wan, and from his son, the duke of 
Chau. The composition of Wan's portion is referred to the year 
B. C. 1143. As an authority for the ancient religion of China, 
therefore, the Yi is by no means equal to the Shu and the Shih. 
It is based on diagrams, or lineal figures, ascribed to Fuhsi, and 

made up of whole and divided lines ( and ). What their 

framer intended by these figures we do not know. No doubt there 
was a tradition about it, and I am willing to believe that it found 
a home in the existing Yi. . . . The character called Yi is the 
symbol for the idea of change. The fashion of the world is con- 
tinually being altered. We have action and re-action, flux and 
reflux — now one condition, and immediately its opposite. The 

1 See The Shih King ; or the Book of Ancient Poetry, translated into English Yerse, 
with Essays and Notes, by James Legge. Lond., 18*76. 

2 Decade III, Ode 2, p. 329, Sacred Books of the East, vol. iii. Oxford, 1879. 

3 The Yi King is translated and annotated by Legge in vol. xvi of the Sacred Books 
of the East. Oxford, 1882. 



32 

vicissitudes in the worlds of sense and society have their correspon- 
dencies in the changes that take place in the lines of the diagrams. 
Again, certain relations and conditions of men and things lead to 
good, are fortunate; and certain others lead to evil, are unfortunate; 
and these results are indicated by the relative position of the lines* 
Those lines were systematically changed by manipulating with a 
fixed number of the stalks of a certain plant. In this way the Yi 
served the purpose of divination; and since such is the nature of 
the book, a reader must be prepared for much in it that is tantaliz- 
ing, fantastic, and perplexing." x 

The two remaining classics are of less interest and importance. 
The Li Ki and The Li Ki King is a record of rites, consisting of three 
the Khun Khiu. collections, called "the Three Rituals," and is the most 
bulky of the Five King. It contains regulations for the administra- 
tion of the government, describes the various officers and their 
duties, and the rules of etiquette by which scholars and officers 
should order their conduct on social and state occasions. The 
Khun Khiu King is of the nature of a supplement to the historical 
annals of the Shu King. It was compiled by Confucius from the 
annals of his native state of Lu, and extends from the year B. C. 722 
to B. C. 481. 

The Chinese classics known as "the Four Shu" have not the 
rank and authority of the Five King. They are the works of dis- 
ciples of Confucius, and consist (1) of the Lun Yu, or Discourses 
of Confucius and conversations between him and his followers ; 
(2) the works of Mencius, next to Confucius the greatest sage and 
teacher of Confucianism; (3) the Ta Hsio, or Great Learning, 
ascribed to Tszang-tsze, a disciple of Confucius ; and (4) the Kung 
Yung, or Doctrine of the Mean, a production of Tszesze, the grand- 
son of Confucius. 2 There is also the Hsiao King, or Classic of 
Filial Piety, which holds a high place in Chinese literature. 3 

In the preface to his translation of the Sacred Books of China, 
Legge observes, " that the ancient books of China do not profess to 
have been inspired, or to contain what we should call a Revelation. 
Historians, poets, and others wrote them as they were moved in 
their own minds. An old poem may occasionally contain what it 
says was spoken by God, but we can only understand that language 
as calling attention emphatically to the statement to which it is 

1 The Religions of China, pp. 37, 38. 

2 See The Chinese Classics, with a Translation, Critical and Exegetical Notes, Pro- 
legomena, and copious Indexes. Hong Kong, 1861-1865. 

3 The Hsiao King is translated and annotated by Legge in vol. iii of Sacred Books 
of the East. 



33 

prefixed. We also read of Heaven's raising up the great ancient 
sovereigns and teachers, and variously assisting them to accomplish 
their undertakings; but all this need not be more than what a relig- 
ious man of any country might affirm at the present day of direc- 
tion, help, and guidance given to himself and others from above." 

Whatever the true solution of the questions may be, the facts 
that distinguished Chinese scholars dispute as to whether the Con- 
fucian Sacred Books recognize the existence of a personal God, and 
that missionaries, in translating the Christian Scriptures into Chi- 
nese, scruple over a word that will properly represent the Christian 
idea of God, show the comparative vagueness and obscurity of the 
religion of the Chinese scriptures. 

The Egyptian Book of the Dead. 

A most mysterious and interesting work is the Sacred Book of 
the ancient Egyptians, commonly known as the Book of the Dead. 
Some Egyptologists prefer the title "Funeral Ritual," inasmuch 
as it contains many prescriptions and prayers to be used Its different 
in funeral services, and the vignettes which appear on names. 
many copies represent funeral processions, and priests reading the 
formularies out of a book. But as the prayers are, for the most 
part, the language to be used by the departed in their progress 
through the under world, the title " Book of the Dead " has been 
generally adopted. 

The Egyptian title of the work is, Book of the Peri eon hru, three 
simple words, but by no means easy of explanation when taken to- 
gether without a context. 1 Peri signifies "coming forth," hru is 
"day," and em is the preposition signifying "from," susceptible, 
like the same preposition in other languages, of a variety of uses. 
The probable meaning of Peri em hru is " coming forth by day," 
and is to be understood mainly of the immortality and resurrection 
of the dead. The book exists in a great number of manuscripts 
recovered from Egyptian tombs, and the text is very corrupt; for 
as the writing was not intended for mortal eyes, but to be buried 
with the dead, copyists would not be likely to be very scrupulous in 
their work. But the book exists not only on papyrus rolls that 
were deposited in the tombs, but many of the chapters are inscribed 
upon coffins, mummies, sepulchral wrappings, statues, and the walls 
of tombs. Some tombs may be said to contain entire recensions of 

1 The Religion of Ancient Egypt, by P. Le Page Renouf. Hibbert Lectures for 
18*79, p. 181. New York, 1880. Our account of the Book of the Dead is condensed 
mainly from Renouf's fifth Lecture. 



34 

the book. But no two copies contain exactly the same chapters, or 
corrupt and follow the same arrangement. The papyrus of Turin, 
ditiorTof °the P u ^ sne( i ^J Lepsius, contains one hundred and sixty- 
text, five chapters, and is the longest known. But a consider- 
able number of chapters found in other manuscripts are not included 
in it. None of the copies contain the entire collection of chapters, 
but the more ancient manuscripts have fewer chapters than the 
more recent. There is a great uniformity of style and of grammat- 
ical forms, as compared with other productions of Egyptian litera- 
ture, and nothing can exceed the simplicity and brevity of the 
sentences. A critical collation of a sufficient number of copies of 
each chapter will, in time, restore the text to as accurate a standard 
as could be attained in the most nourishing days of the old Egyp- 
tian monarchy. 

The book is mythological throughout, 1 and assumes the reader's 
it obscurit familiarity with its myths and legends. The difficulty 
in the subject of its exposition is not in literally translating the text, 
but in understanding the meaning concealed beneath 
familiar words. The English translation by Samuel Birch, pub- 
lished in the fifth volume of Bunsen's Egypt's Place in Universal 
History, is an exact rendering of the text of the Turin manuscript, 
and to an Englishman gives nearly as correct an impression of the 
original as the text itself would do to an Egyptian who had not 
been carefully taught the mysteries of his religion. 

The foundation of Egyptian mythology is the legend of Osiris. 2 
The Osiris le- Having long ruled in Egypt, he was at last slain by the 
gend J^ basis ey ^ Typhon, enclosed in a mummy case, and cast into 
mythology. the river Nile. Isis, his sister and spouse, sought long 
for his body, and at length found it at Byblus, on the Phoenician 
coast, where it had been tossed by the waves. She brought it back 
to Egypt, and buried it; and when Horus, their son, grew up, he 
slew the evil Typhon, and so avenged his father. Osiris, however, 
was not dead. He had, in fact, descended to the under world, and 
established his dominion there, and at the same time revived in the 
person of his son Horus, and renewed his dominion over the living, 

1 " The Ritual," says Birch, " is, according to Egyptian notions, essentially an in- 
spired work; and the term Hermetic, so often applied by profane writers to these 
books, in reality means inspired. It is Thoth himself who speaks and reveals the 
will of the gods and the mysterious nature of divine things to man. . . . Portions of 
them are expressly stated to have been written by the very finger of Thoth himself, 
and to have been the composition of a great God." Introduction to his translation of 
the Funeral Ritual, in Bunsen's Egypt's Place in Universal History, vol. v, p. 183. 

2 On this Egyptian legend comp. Bunsen, Egypt's Place in Universal History, vol. i f 
pp. 423-439, and George Rawlinson, History of Ancient Egypt, vol. i, pp. 365-371. 



35 

The usual explanation of this legend makes it a mythical por- 
traiture of the annual dying and reviving of the powers Th 
of nature under the peculiar conditions of the valley of meaning of the 
the Nile. Osiris represents the fertilizing river; Isis myth * 
the fruit-bearing land; Typhon the evil spirit of the parched des- 
erts and the salt sea, the demon of drought and barrenness. Horus 
is the sun, appearing in the vernal equinox, and heralding the rising 
of the Nile. Accordingly, when the Nile sinks before the scorch- 
ing winds of the Libyan desert, Osiris is slain by Typhon. Isis, 
the land, then sighs and yearns for her lost brother and spouse. 
But when the Nile again overflows, it is a resurrection of Osiris, 
and the vernal sun destroys the demon of drought and renews the 
face of nature. Other slightly varying explanations of the legend 
have been given, but whatever particular view we adopt, it will be 
easy to see how the drapery of these legends might, in course of 
time, come to be used of the death and resurrection of man. Hence 
we find that the names of mythical personages are constantly re- 
curring in the Book of the Dead. 

The beatification of the dead is the main subject of the book. 
The blessed dead are represented as enjoying an exis- 
tence similar to that which they had led on earth. They the dead the 
have the use of all their limbs, eat and drink, and satisfy main subject - 
all their physical wants as in their earthly life. But they are not 
confined to any one locality, or to any one form or mode of exis- 
tence. They have the range of the entire universe, in every shape 
and form which they desire. Twelve chapters of the Book of the 
Dead consist of formulas to be used in effecting certain transforma- 
tions. The forms assumed, according to these chapters, are the 
turtledove, the serpent Sata, the bird Bennu, the crocodile Sebek, 
the god Ptah, a golden hawk, the chief of the principal gods, a 
soul, a lotusflower, and a heron. The transformations to which 
these chapters refer, however, are far from exhausting the list of 
possible ones. No limit is imposed on the will of the departed, and 
in this respect the Egyptian doctrine of transmigration differs wide- 
ly from the Pythagorean. 

Throughout the Book of the Dead, the identification of the de- 
ceased with Osiris, or assimilation to him, is taken for identification 
granted, and all the deities of the family of Osiris are ^^ 0siris - 
supposed to perform for the deceased whatever the legend records 
as having been done for Osiris himself. Thus, in the eighteenth 
chapter, the deceased is brought before a series of divinities in 
succession, the gods of Heliopolis, Abydos, and other localities, and 
at each station the litany begins : 



36 

O Tehuti [or Thoth], who causest Osiris to triumph against his oppo- 
nents, cause the Osiris (such a one) to triumph against his opponents, even 
as thou hast made Osiris to triumph against his opponents. 

In the next chapter, which is another recension of the eighteenth, 
and is entitled the "Crown of Triumph," the deceased is declared 
, triumphant forever, and all the gods in heaven and earth repeat 
this, and the chapter ends with the following: 

Horus has repeated this declaration four times, and all his enemies fall 
prostrate before him annihilated. Horus, the son of Isis, repeats it millions 
of times, and all his enemies fall annihilated. They are carried off to the 
place of execution in the East; their heads are cut off, their necks are brok- 
en; their, thighs are severed, and delivered up to the great destroyer who 
dwells in Aati; they shall not come forth from the custody of Seb forever. 

But not to Osiris only is the deceased assimilated. In the forty- 
other assimi- second chapter every limb is assimilated to a different 
lations. deity; the hair to Nu, the face to Ra, the eyes to 

Hathor, the ears to Apuat, the nose to the god of Sechem, the lips 
to Anubis, the teeth to Selket, and so on, the catalogue ending with' 
the words : " There is not a limb in him without a god, and Tehuti 
is a safeguard to all his members." Further on it is said : 

Not men, nor gods, nor the ghosts of the departed, nor the damned, 
past, present, or future, whoever they be, can do him hurt. He it is who 
cometh forth in safety. "Whom men know not" is his name. The "Yes- 
terday which sees endless years" is his name, passing in triumph by the 
roads of heaven. The deceased is the Lord of eternity ; he is reckoned even 
as Chepera ; he is the master of the kingly crown. 

The one hundred and forty-ninth chapter gives an account of the 
Dangers of the terrible nature of certain divinities and localities which 
deceased. ^he deceased must encounter — gigantic and venomous 

serpents, gods with names significant of death and destruction, 
waters and atmospheres of flames. But none of these prevail over 
the Osiris ; he passes through all things without harm, and lives in 
peace with the fearful gods who preside over these abodes. Some 
of these gods remind one of the demons in Dante's Inferno. But 
though ministers of divine justice, their nature is not evil. The 
following are invocations, from the seventeenth chapter, to be used 
of one passing through these dangers : 

O Ra, in thine egg^ radiant in thy disk shining forth from the horizon, 
swimming over the steel firmament, sailing over the pillars of Shu; thou 
who hast no second among the gods, who producest the winds by the 
flames of thy mouth, and who enlightenest the worlds with thy splendours, 



37 

save the departed from that god whose nature is a mystery, and whose 
eyebrows are as the arms of the balance on the night when Aauit was 
weighed. . . . O Scarabseus god in thy bark, whose substance is self-orig- 
inated, save the Osiris from those watchers to whom the Lord of spirits 
Qas entrusted the observation of his enemies, and from whose observations 
none can escape. Let me not fall under their swords, nor go to their 
blocks of execution ; let me not remain in their abodes ; let me not rest upon 
their beds [of torment] ; let me not fall into their nets. Let naught befall 
me which the gods abhor. 

We have not space for further illustrations of this most interest- 
ing work. It will be seen how this Funeral Ritual, or Book of the 
Dead, embodies the Egyptian doctrines of a future state, and the 
rewards and punishments of that after life. 1 But it will also be 
observed how thoroughly its theology is blended with all that is 
superstitious and degrading in a polytheistic mythology. 



The Kqran. 

The Mohammedan Bible is a comparatively modern book, and 
easily accessible to English readers. 2 It is about half the size of 
the Old Testament, and contains one hundred and four- Gen erai char- 
teen chapters, called Suras. It is doubtful whether acter - 
Mohammed ever learned to read or write. He dictated his revela- 
tions to his disciples, and they wrote them on date leaves, bits of 
parchment, tablets of white stone, and shoulder-blades of sheep. 
These were written during the last twenty years of the prophet's 
life, and a year after his death the different fragments were col- 
lected by his followers, and arranged according to the length of the 
chapters, beginning with the longest and ending with the shortest. 
So the book, as regards its contents, presents a strange medley, 
having no real beginning, middle, or end. And yet it is probably 
a faithful transcript of Mohammed's mind and heart as exhibited 
during the latter portion of his life. In some passages he seems to 
have been inspired with a holy zeal, and eloquently proclaims the 
glory of Almighty God, the merciful and compassionate. Other 

1 See J. P. Thompson's Article on the Egyptian Doctrine of a Future State, in the 
Bibliotheca Sacra, January, 1868, in which a fair analysis of the teachings of the Book 
of the Dead is given. 

2 Sale's English version of the Koran has been published in many forms, and his 
Preliminary Discourse is invaluable for the study of Islam. The translation of Rev. 
I. M. Rodwell (Lond., 1861) has the Suras arranged in chronological order. But the 
recent translation by E. H. Palmer (vols, vi and ix of Miiller's Sacred Books of the 
East) is undoubtedly the best English version. 



passages have the form and spirit of a bulletin of war. 1 In another he 
seems to make an apology for taking to himself an additional wife. 2 
Another suggests a political manoeuvre. But, on the whole, the 
Koran is a most tedious book to read. It is full of repetitions, and 
seems incapable of happy translation into any other language. Its 
crowning glory is its glowing Arabic diction. " Regarding it," says 
Palmer, "from a perfectly impartial and unbiassed standpoint, we 
find that it expresses the thoughts and ideas of a Bedawi Arab 
in Bedawi language and metaphor. The language is noble and 
forcible, but it is not elegant in the sense of literary refinement. 
To Mohammed's hearers it must have been startling from the 
manner in which it brought great truths home to them in the lan- 
guage of their everyday life." 3 Mohammed was wont to urge 
that the marvellous excellence of his book was a standing proof 
of its divine and superhuman origin. "If men and genii," says 
he, "united themselves together to bring the like of this Koran, 
they could not bring the like, though they should back each 
other up !" 4 

The founder of Islam appears to have been from early life a 
Life and claims contemplative soul. • In the course of his travels as a 
of Mohammed, merchant he probably often met and talked with Jews 
and Christians. The Koran contains on almost every page some 
allusion to Jewish history or Christian doctrine; but Mohammed's 
acquaintance with both Judaism and Christianity appears to have 
been formed from oral sources, and was confused with many vague 
and silly traditions. It should be observed, too, that at that period 
an earnest seeker after truth, under circumstances like those which 
tended chiefly to fashion Mohammed's mind and character, might 
very easily have become bewildered by the various traditions of 
the Jews and the foolish controversies of the Christians. The 
Church was then distracted with controversy over the Trinity and 
the use of images in worship. To Mohammed, a religion which 
filled its churches with images of saints was no better than a gross 
idolatry. His knowledge of Jesus was gathered largely from the 
apocryphal gospels and through Jewish channels. Hence we may 
understand the reason of the perverted form in which so many 
Christian ideas are treated in the Koran. 

Mohammed claimed to be the last of six great apostles who had 
been sent upon divine missions into the world. Those six are 

1 Sura iii, 135-145 ; viii, xl. Comp. Muir, Life of Mahomet, vol. iii, p. 224. 

2 Sura xxxiii, 35-40 ; lxvi. 

* The Qur'an. Translated by E. H. Palmer. Introduction, p. lxxvii. 
4 Koran, Sura xvii, 90. 



39 

Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed. Nothing 
specially new or original is to be found in the Moslem bible. It 
has been maintained that "Islam was little else than a republica- 
tion of Judaism, with such modifications as suited' it to Arabian soil, 
plus the important addition of the prophetic mission of Moham- 
med." 1 The following passage from the fifth Sura well illustrates 
the general style of the Koran: 

[20] God's is, the kingdom of the heavens and the earth and what is 
between the two; he created what he will, for God is mighty over all! 

But the Jews and the Christians say, " We are the sons of God and his 
beloved." Say, "Why then does he punish you for your sins?" nay, ye 
are mortals of those whom he has created! He pardons whom he pleases, 
and punishes whom he pleases;- for God's is the kingdom of the heavens 
and the earth, and what is between the two, and unto him the journey is. 

people of the book! our apostle has come to you, explaining to you 
the interval of apostles ; lest ye say, " There came not to us a herald of 
glad tidings nor a warner." But there has come to you j&ow a herald of 
glad tidings and a warner, and God is mighty over all! 

When Moses said to his people, "O my people! remember the favour of 
God toward you when he made among you prophets, and made for you 
kings, and brought you what never was brought to any body in the 
worlds. O my people! enter the holy land which God has prescribed for 
you; and be ye not thrust back upon your hinder parts and retreat losers." 
[25] They said, "O Moses! verily, therein is a people, giants; and we 
will surely not enter therein until they go out from thence ; but if they go 
out then we will enter in." Then said two men of those who fear, — God 
had been gracious to them both, — "Enter ye upon them by the door, and 
when ye have entered it, verily, ye shall be victorious ; and upon God do 
ye rely if ye be believers." They said, u O Moses! we shall never enter it 
so long as they are therein; so, go thou and thy Lord and fight ye twain; 
verily, we will sit down here." Said he, "My Lord, verily, I can control 
only myself and my brother; therefore part us from these sinful people." 
He said, "Then, verily, it is forbidden them; for forty years shall they 
wander about in the earth; so vex not thyself for the sinful people." 

[30] Recite to them the story of the two sons of Adam; truly when they 
offered an offering and it was accepted from one of them, and was not 
accepted from the other, that one said, "I will surely kill thee;" he said, 
"God only accepts from those who fear. If thou dost stretch forth to me 
thine hand to kill me, I will not stretch forth mine hand to kill thee; 
verily, I fear God the Lord of the worlds ; verily, I wish that thou mayest 
draw upon thee my sin and thy sin, and be of the fellows of the fire, for 
that is the reward of the unjust." But his soul allowed him to slay his 
brother, and he slew him, and in the morning lie was of those who lose. 
And God sent a crow to scratch in the earth and show him how he might 

1 Mohammed and Mohammedanism. Lectures by R. Bosworth Smith, p. 143. New 
York, 1875. 



40 

hide his brother's shame, he said, "Alas, for me! Am I too helpless to 
become like this crow and hide my brother's shame?" and in the morning 
he was of those who did repent. 

[35] For this cause have we prescribed to the children of Israel that 
whoso kills a soul, unless it be for another soul or for violence in the land, 
it is as though he had killed men altogether; but whoso saves one, it is 
as though he saved men altogether. 1 

The one hundred and twelfth Sura is held in special veneration 
among the Mohammedans, and is popularly accounted equal in 
value to a third part of the entire Koran. It is said to have been 
revealed in answer to one who wished to know the distinguishing 
attributes of Mohammed's God. The following is Palmer's 

version: 

In the name of the merciful and compassionate God 

Say, He is God alone! 

God the Eternal ! 

He begets not, and is not begotten ! 

Nor is there like unto him any one ! 

The following passage, from the beginning of the second Sura, 
is to be understood as the words of the Angel Gabriel to Moham- 
med, and showing him the character and importance of the Koran: 

That is the book ! there is no doubt therein ; a guide to the pious, who 
believe in the unseen, and are steadfast in prayer, and of what we have 
given them expend in alms ; who believe in what is revealed to thee, and 
what was revealed before thee, and of the hereafter they are sure. These 
are in guidance from their Lord, and these are the prosperous. Verily, 
those who misbelieve, it is the same to them if ye warn them or if ye warn 
them not, they will not believe. God has set a seal upon their hearts and 
on their hearing ; and on their eyes is dimness, and for them is grievous 
woe. And there are those among men who say, "We believe in God and 
in the last day; " but they do not believe. They would deceive God and 
those who do believe ; but they deceive only themselves and they do not 
perceive. In their hearts is a sickness, and God has made them still more 
sick, and for them is grievous woe because they lied. And when it is said 
to them, "Do not evil in the earth," they say, "We do but what is right." 
Are not they the evil doers ? and yet they do not perceive. And when it is 
said to them, "Believe as other men believe," they say, "Shall we believe 
as fools believe ? " Are not they themselves the fools? and yet they do 
not know. And when they meet those who believe, they say, "We do 
believe;" but when they go aside with their devils, they say, "We are 
with you ; we were but mocking ! " God shall mock at them and let them 
go on in their rebellion, blindly wandering on. 2 

-Palmer's translation, Part I., pp. 100-102. 
8 Ibid., pp. 2, 3. 



41 

The following, from the same Sura, is a specimen of the manner 
in which Mohammed garbles and presents incidents of Israelitish 
history: 

Dost thou not look at the crowd of the children of Israel after Moses' 
time, when they said to a prophet of theirs, " Raise up for us a king, and 
we will fight in God's way? " He said, "Will ye perhaps, if it be written 
down for you to fight, refuse to fight ? " They said, "And why should we 
not fight in God's way, now that we are dispossessed of our homes and 
sons?" But when it was written down for them to fight they turned 
back, save a few of them, and God knows who are evil doers. Then their 
prophet said to them, "Verily, God has raised up for you Taiut as a 
king;" they said, "How can the kingdom be his over us; we have more 
right to the kingdom than he, for he has not an amplitude of wealth?" 
He said, "Verily, God has chosen him over you, and has provided him 
with an extent of knowledge and of form. God gives the kingdom unto 
whom he will; God comprehends and knows." 

Then said to them their prophet, " The sign of his kingdom is that there 
shall come to you the ark with the shechinah in it from your Lord, and the 
relics of what the family of Moses and the family of Aaron left ; the angels 
shall bear it." In that is surely a sign to you if ye believe. 

"Whatever opinion we may form of the Koran, or of Islam, it 
must be conceded that the man, who, like Mohammed, in one 
generation organized a race of savage tribes into a united people, 
founded an empire which for more than a thousand years has 
covered a territory as extensive as that of Rome in her proudest 
days, and established a religion which to-day numbers over a 
hundred million adherents, must have been an extraordinary char- 
acter, and his life and works must be worthy of careful philosophic 
study. But it will also be conceded, by all competent to judge, 
that, as a volume of sacred literature, the Koran is very deficient 
in those elements of independence and originality which are notice- 
able in the sacred books of the other great religions of the world. 
The strict Mohammedans regard every syllable of the Koran as of 
a directly divine origin. "The divine revelation," observes Muir, 
"was the cornerstone of Islam. The recital of a passage formed 
an essential part of every celebration of public worship; and its 
private perusal and repetition was enforced as a duty and a privi- 
lege, fraught with the richest religious merit. This is the uni- 
versal voice of early tradition, and may be gathered from the 
revelation itself. The Koran was accordingly committed to 
memory more or less by every adherent of Islam, and the extent 
to which it could be recited was reckoned one of the chief dis- 
tinctions of nobility in the early Moslem empire. The custom of 



42 

Arabia favoured the task. Passionately fond of poetry, yet pos- 
sessed of but limited means and skill in committing to writing the 
effusions of their bards, the Arabs had long been habituated to 
imprint them on the living tablets of their hearts. The recol- 
lective faculty was thus cultivated to the highest pitch; and it was 
applied with all the ardour of an awakened Arab spirit to the 
Koran. Several of Mohammed's followers, according to early tra- 
dition, could, during his lifetime, repeat with scrupulous accuracy 
the entire revelation." 1 

The Eddas. 
Two ancient collections of Scandinavian poems and legends, 
. . known as the Elder and the Younger Edda, embody the 

General char- & ' J 

acter of the mythology of the Teutonic tribes which settled in early 
tTvo Eddas. times in the sea-girt lands of Denmark, Sweden, and 
Norway. From these tribes migrated also the ancient colonists of 
Iceland. To these old Norsemen the Eddas hold a position corre- 
sponding to that of the Vedas among the ancient Hindus, and the 
Avesta among the Persians. 

In the old Norse language the word Edda means ancestress, or 
great-grandmother. Probably the poems and traditions so named 
were long perpetuated orally by the venerable mothers, who repeated 
them to their children and children's children at the blazing fire- 
sides of those northern homes. The Elder Edda, often called the 
Poetic Edda, consists of thirty-nine poems, and would nearly equal 
in size the books of Psalms and Proverbs combined. The Younger 
or Prose Edda is a collection of the myths of the Scandinavian 
deities, and furnishes to some extent a commentary on the older 
Edda, from the songs of which it quotes frequently. These inter- 
esting works were quite unknown to the learned world until the 
latter part of the seventeenth century. But it appears that the 
poems of the older Edda were collected about the beginning of the 
twelfth century by Saemund Sigfusson, an Icelandic priest, who, 
after pursuing classical and theological studies in the universities of 
France and Germany, returned to Iceland and settled in a village at 
the foot of Mount Hecla. Whether he collected these poems from 
oral tradition, or from runic manuscripts or inscriptions, is uncertain. 
'A copy of this Edda on vellum, believed to date from the fourteenth 
century, was found in Iceland by Bishop Sveinsson in 1643, and was 
subsequently published under the title of The Edda of Saemund 
the Learned. 2 The prose Edda is ascribed to the celebrated Ice- 

1 The Life of Mahomet, vol. i. Introduction, p. 5. London, 1861. 

2 Edda Saemundar hins Froda, Copenhagen. 3 vols. 1787-1828. The third volume 
contains the Lexicon Mythologicum of Finn Magnusson. 



43 

landic historian, Snorri Sturlason (born 1178), who probably collect- 
ed its several parts from oral tradition and other sources. The first 
copy known to Europeans was found by Jonsson in 1628, and the first 
complete edition was published by Rask, at Stockholm, in 1818. * 
The first, and perhaps oldest, poem of the Elder Edda is entitled 

the Voluspa, that is, the Song of the Prophetess. It 

. . „ ° j. J . The Voluspa. 

narrates in poetic form the creation ot the universe 

and of man, the origin of evil, and how death entered into the 

world. It speaks of a future destruction and renovation of the 

universe, and of the abodes of bliss and woe. The prophetess 

thus begins her song: 

1. All noble souls, yield me devout attention, 
Ye high and low of Heiindall's race, 2 

I will All Father's works make known, 
The oldest sayings which I call to mind. 

2. Of giants eight was I first born, 
They reared me up from ancient times ; 
Nine worlds I know, nine limbs I know 
Of that strong trunk within the earth. 3 

3. In that far age when Ymir 4 lived, 
There was no sand, nor sea, nor saline wave; 
Earth there M r as not, nor lofty heaven, 

A yawning deep, but verdure none, 

4. Until Bor's sons the spheres upheaved, 
And they the mighty Midgard 5 formed. 

1 An English translation of the Poetic Edda was published by Benjamin Thorpe 
(Two parts, London, 1866), but is now out of print. Comp. Icelandic Poetry, or the 
Edda of Saemund translated into English verse by A. S. Cottle (Bristol, 1*79*7). Many 
fragments of the lays are given in Anderson's Norse Mythology (Chicago, 1880). 
An English translation of the Prose Edda is given in Blackwell's edition of Mallet r s 
Northern Antiquities (Bonn's Antiquarian Library). A new translation by E. B. 
Anderson has been published at Chicago (1880). A very complete and convenient 
German translation of both Eddas, with explanations by Karl Simrock, has passed 
through many editions (seventh improved edition, Stuttgart, 18*78). 

2 Heimdall, according to the old Norse mythology, was the father and founder of 
the different classes of men, nobles, churls, and thralls. 

3 Referring to the great mundane ash-tree where the gods assemble every day in 
council. ' This tree strikes its roots through all worlds, and is thus described in the 
nineteenth verse of the Voluspa : 

An ash I know named Yggdrasil, 

A lofty tree wet with white mist, 

Thence comes the dew which in the valleys falls ; 

Ever green it stands o'er the Urdar-fount. 

4 Ymir was the progenitor of the giants, and out of his body the world was created. 

5 The Prose Edda explains that the earth is round without, and encircled by the 
ocean, the outward shores of which were assigned to the race of giants. But around 



The southern sun shone on the cliffs 

And green the ground became with plants. 

5. The southern sun, the moon's companion, 
Held with right hand the steeds of heaven. 
The sun knew not where she 1 might set, 
The moon knew not what power he 1 had, 
The stars knew not where they might dwell. 

6. Then went the Powers to judgment seats, 
The gods most holy held a council, 

To night and new moon gave they names, 
They named the morning and the midday, 
And evening, to arrange the times. 2 

Another very interesting poem is the Grimnis-mal, or Lay of 
Grimner, in which we find a description of the twelve habitations 
of heavenly deities, by which some scholars understand the twelve 
signs of the zodiac. The sixth poem is called the Hava-mal, or 
Sublime Lay. It is an ethical poem, embodying a considerable col- 
lection of ancient Norse proverbs. The following passages, from 
Bishop Percy's prose translation, are specimens : 

1. Consider and examine well all your doors before you venture to stir 
abroad : for he is exposed to continual danger, whose enemies lie in am- 
bush concealed in his court. 

3. 'To the guest, who enters your dwelling with frozen knees, give the 
warmth of your fire : he who hath travelled over the mountains hath need 
of food, and well-dried garments. 

4. Offer water to him who sits down at your table ; for he hath occasion 
to cleanse his hands: and entertain him honourably and kindly, if you 
would win from him friendly words and a grateful return. 

5. He who travelleth hath need of wisdom. One may do at home what- 
soever one will ; but he who is ignorant of good manners will only draw 
contempt upon himself, when he comes to sit down with men well instructed. 

7. He who goes to a feast, where he is not expected, either speaks with 
a lowly voice, or is silent; he listens with his ears, and is attentive with 
his eyes; by this he acquires knowledge and wisdom. 

8. Happy he, who draws upon himself the applause and benevolence of 
men ! for whatever depends upon the will of others, is hazardous and un- 
certain. 

a portion of the inland Odin, Yile, and Ve, the sons of Bor, raised a bulwark against 
turbulent giants, and to the portion of the earth which it encircled they gave the name 
of Midgard. For this structure, it is said, they used the eyebrows of Ymir, of his flesh 
they formed the land, of his sweat and blood the seas, of his bones the mountains, 
of his hair the trees, of his brains the clouds, and of his skull the vault of heaven. 
See Mallet, Northern Antiquities, pp. 98, 405. Anderson, Norse Mythology, p. 175. 

1 In the Norse language, sun is feminine and moon is masculine. 

9 Translated from Simrock's German version of the Voluspa. 



45 

10. A man can carry with him no better provision for his journey than 
the strength of understanding. In a foreign country this will be of more 
use to him than treasures; and will introduce him to the table of strangers. 

12-13. A man cannot carry a worse custom with him to a banquet than 
that of drinking too much ; the more the drunkard swallows, the less is 
his wisdom, till he loses his reason. The bird of oblivion sings before 
those who inebriate themselves, and steals away their souls. 1 

We add a single extract from the Prose Eclda, the account of the 
formation of the first human pair : 

One day, as the sons of Bor were walking along the sea-beach they found 
two stems of wood, out of which they shaped a man and a woman. The 
first (Odin) infused into them life and spirit; the second (Yile) endowed 
them with reason and the power of motion; the third (Ve) gave them 
speech and features, hearing and vision. The man they called Ask, and 
the woman, Embla. From these two descend the whole human race, whose 
assigned dwelling was within Midgard. Then the sons of Bor built in the 
middle of the universe the city called Asgard, where dwell the gods and 
their kindred, and from that abode work out so many wondrous things, 
both on the earth and in the heavens above it. There is in that city a place 
called Hlidskjalf, and when Odin is seated there on his lofty throne he sees 
over the whole world, discerns all the actions of men, and comprehends 
whatever he contemplates. His wife is Frigga, the daughter of Fjorgyn, 
and they and their offspring form the race that we call the iEsir, a race 
that dwells in Asgard the old, and the regions around it, and that we know 
to be entirely divine. "Wherefore Odin may justly be called All-Father, for 
he is verily the father of all, of gods as well as of men, and to his power 
all things owe their existence. Earth is his daughter and his wife, and 
with her he had his first-born son, Asa-Thor, who is endowed with strength 
and valour, and therefore quelleth he everything that hath life. 2 

In all the voluminous literature of the Greeks and the Romans 
we find no single work or collection of writings analogous to the 
above-named sacred books. 3 It would not be difficult to compile 
from Greek and Roman poets and philosophers a body of sacred 
literature which would compare favourably with that of any of the 
Gentile nations. But such a compilation would have, as a volume, 
no recognized authority or national significance. The books we 
have described, like our own Bible, have had a historical develop- 
ment, and a distinct place in the religious culture of great nations. 

1 See the whole poem as translated by Thorpe in Anderson's Norse Mythology, pp. 
130-155, and the mysterious Runic section on pp. 254-259. 

2 Blackwell's translation, in Mallet, Northern Antiquities, pp. 405, 406. 

3 Whatever may have been the nature and contents of the old Sibylline Books, 
which were kept in the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus at Rome, they perished long 
ago, and their real character and use are now purely matters of conjecture. 



46 

The Koran, the Avesta, the Pitakas, and the Chinese classics em- 
body the precepts and laws which have been a rule of faith to mill- 
ions. The vedic hymns and the Egyptian ritual have directed the 
devotions of countless generations of earnest worshippers. They 
are, therefore, to be accounted sacred books, and are invaluable for 
the study of history and of comparative theology. 1 

In forming a proper estimate of these bibles of the nations, we 

. , must take each one as a whole. In the brief citations 

These books 

must be studied we have given above, the reader can only learn the 
as a whole. general tone and spirit of the best portions of the sev- 
eral books. The larger part of all of them is filled with either un- 
trustworthy legends, or grotesque fancies and vague speculations. 
They abound in polytheistic superstitions, incomprehensible meta- 
physics, and mythological tales. But, doubtless, back of all this 
mass of accumulated song and superstition and legend, there was 
once a foundation of comparatively pure worship and belief. Even 
Mohammed, whose life and works stand out in the light of reliable 
history, appears to have been, at the beginning of his career, an 
earnest seeker after truth and a zealous reformer. But afterward 
the pride of power and numerous victories warped his moral integ- 
rity, and later portions of the Koran are apologies for his crimes. 
It is difficult to see what logical connexion the superstitions of 
modern Taoism have with the teachings of Laotzse. In fact, the 
original documents and ideas of most of the great religions of the 
East appear to have become lost in the midst of the accretions of 
later times. Especially is this true of Brahmanism and Buddhism. 
Who can now certainly declare what were the very words of Bud- 
dha? The Tripitaka is an uncertain guide. It is much as if the 
apocryphal gospels, the legends of anchorites and monks and mys- 
tics, and the dreams of the schoolmen, were all strung together, 
and intermingled with the words and works of Jesus. Roman 
Catholicism is itself a gross corruption and caricature of the religion 
of Jesus Christ; and were it the sole representative of the Gospel 
in the world to-day it would be a striking analogue of Buddhism. 
Could we go back to the true historical starting point of the great 
religions, we would, perhaps, find them all, in one form and another, 

1 The Holy Scriptures of the Sikhs, a politico-religious sect of India, constitute a 
volume full of interest, and equal in size to the Old Testament. It is commonly 
known as the Granth. But it is a late work, compiled about A. D. 1500, and has no 
national or historical value to entitle it to a place among the bibles of the nations. It 
Las been translated into English, and published at the expense of the British Govern- 
ment for India. See The Adi Granth, or the Holy Scriptures of the Sikhs, translated 
from the original Gurmukhi, with Introductory Essays, by Dr. Ernest Thrumpp. 
Lond., 187 V. 



47 

connected with some great patriarchal Jethro, or Melchizedek, 
whose name and genealogy are now alike lost to mankind. 

It will not do to take up the various bibles of the world, and, 
having selected choice extracts from them all, compare such selec- 
tions alone with similar extracts from the Christian and Jewish 
Scriptures. These latter, we doubt not, can furnish more exquisite 
passages than all the others combined. But such comparison of 
choice excerpts is no real test. Each bible must be taken as an 
organic whole, and viewed in its historical and national Notable superi- 
relations. Then will it be seen, as one crowning glorv ority of the 01d 

-» o o «- and New Tes- 

of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, that tament scrip- 
they are the carefully preserved productions of some tures * 
sixteen centuries, self-verifying in their historical relations, and 
completed and drvinely sanctioned by the Founder of Christian- 
ity and his apostles in the most critical and cultivated age of 
the Roman Empire. All attempts to resolve these sacred books 
into myths and legends have proved signal failures. The Hebrew 
people were notably a peculiar people, and their national history 
stands out in the clear light of trustworthy testimony. They were 
placed, geographically, in the very center of the great historic 
empires of Egypt, Asia, and Europe; and the accuracy of their 
sacred records is confirmed by the records of these empires. Most 
notable is the fact, moreover, that the languages in which the 
several parts of the sacred canon were written ceased to be living 
tongues about the time when those several parts obtained canonical 
authority; and thereby these sacred books were crystallized into 
imperishable form, and have become historical and linguistic mon- 
uments of their own genuineness. We are, furthermore, confident 
in the assertion that the Holy Scriptures are not only singularly 
free from the superstitions and follies that abound in the sacred 
books of other nations, but also that they contain in substance the 
inculcation of every excellence and virtue to be found in all the 
others. Thus in their entirety they are incomparably superior to 
all other sacred books. 1 

But, taken in parts, the Bible will still maintain a marvellous 
superiority. "Where, in all other literature, will be found a moral 
code comparable, for substance and historical presentation, with the 
Sinaitic decalogue? Where else is there such a golden sum- 

J "It cannot be too strongly stated," says Max Miiller, "that the chief, and in many 
cases the only, interest of the Sacred Books of the East is historical ; that much in 
them is extremely childish, tedious, if not repulsive ; and that no one but the historian 
will be able to understand the important lessons which they teach." Sacred Books of 
the East, vol. i, p. xliii. 



48 

mary of all law and revelation as the first and second command- 
ments of the Saviour? The religious lessons of the Bible are 
set in a historical background of national life and personal experi- 
ence; and largely in biographical sketches true to all the phases of 
human character. 1 Let the diligent student go patiently and care- 
fully through all rival scriptures; let him memorize the noblest 
vedic hymns, and study the Tripitaka with all the enthusiasm of an 
Edwin Arnold; let him search the Confucian classics, and the Tau- 
teh-king of Laotsze, and the sacred books of Persia, Assyria, and 
Babylon; let him devoutly peruse Egyptian ritual, Moslem Koran, 
and Scandinavian Eddas; he yet will find in the Psalms of David a 
beauty and purity infinitely superior to any thing in the Vedas; 
in the gospels of Jesus a glory and splendour eclipsing the boasted 
"Light of Asia;" and in the laws of Moses and the Proverbs 
of Solomon lessons of moral and political wisdom far in advance 
of any thing that Laotsze and Confucius offer. By such study 
and comparisons it will be seen, as not before, how, as a body of 
laws, history, poetry, prophecy, and religious records, the Bible is 
most emphatically the Book of books, and, above all other books 
combined, "profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for 
instruction in righteousness." Such study will dissipate the notion 
that Christianity is equivalent to general goodness, and that the 
Bible is an accident of human history; for it will be seen that the 
Gospel system essentially excludes all other religions, and evinces 
a divine right to supersede them all. The written records of other 
faiths are of the earth and earthy; the Bible is a heavenly gift, in 
language and history wonderfully prepared, and accompanied by 
manifold evidences of being the revelation of God. To devotees 
of other religions the Christian may truly say, in the words of the 
Lord Jesus (John iv, 22): "Ye worship what ye know not, we wor- 
ship what we know, for the salvation is from the Jews." 

1 Tayler Lewis observes : " Every other assumed revelation has been addressed to 
but one phase of humanity. They have been adapted to one age, to one people, or 
one peculiar style of human thought. Their books have never assumed a cosmical 
character, or been capable of any catholic expansion. They could never be ac- 
commodated to other ages, or acclimated to other parts of the world. They are indig- 
enous plants that can never grow out of the zone that gave them birth. Zoroaster 
never made a disciple beyond Persia, or its immediate neighborhood ; Confucius is 
wholly Chinese, as Socrates is wholly Greek." The Divine Human in the Scripture, 
p. 133. New York, 1859. 



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